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This Volume is for
REFERENCE USE ONLY
. . I. _!._, J
« . • • STATE OF
: MISSOURI
OF STATUTE MILES
-
KEY
UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI. ....... .. ...... _ ...... ..nO
MISSOURI STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS ..... . ...... .jQ
Cm TRAINING SCHOOLS ..... ...........,«..........MO
PRIVATE COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES.........,.*
JUNIOR COLLEGES,...,,, ....... ....... ........ , ...... 1...O
HIGH SCHOOLS - 1919
"First Class ..................... ........... ..... ..................,..*
First Oass with Teaclter Training Courses,,.....^
Second Class. ..................... .... ....... ... ...... , ..... ..o
Third Class...,....,,...,.. ......... ..... .„„.„.„ ..... ....©
Unclassified...,.,. ....... *.... ..... .......... ...................o
pe Girardeau
THE PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION
OF TEACHERS FOR
AMERICAN PUBLIC SCHOOLS
A STUDY BASED UPON AN EXAMINATION OF TAX-SUPPORTED
NORMAL SCHOOLS IN THE STATE OF MISSOURI
By
WILLIAM S. LEARNED, WILLIAM C. BAGLEY
AND CHAELES A. McMiiERY, GEORGE D. STEAYEE
WALTEE F. DEAKBOEN, ISAAC L. KANDEL, HOMEE W. JOSSELYN
NEW YORK
THE CARNEGIE FOUNDATION
FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF TEACHING
576 FIFTH AVENUE
D. B. UPDIKE • THE MERRYMOUNT PRESS • BOSTON
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
PREFACE xv
I. INTRODUCTION
A. CHARACTER AND CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ENQUIRY 3
B. METHOD AND PERSONNEL 5
C. A GENERAL STATEMENT OF CONCLUSIONS 7
Democracy and Education; Education and the Teacher; New Standards
Essential for Genuine Education; A New Training for Teachers; The
Teacher and the Public; The Present Crisis in Public Education
II. THE STATE OF MISSOURI 16
Surface 'Features; Characteristics of Population; Occupations; Political
History; Educational Development
III. ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF NORMAL SCHOOLS
A. THE ORIGIN OF NORMAL SCHOOLS IN THE UNITED STATES 22
Earliest Advocacy of Teacher-training; Early Experiments; Development
of Public Opinion; Example of Germany; Efforts of Educational Leaders;
The Term " Normal School;" Teacher-training in Germany; Legislative
Activity in Massachusetts; Normal School Development in Connecticut;
The New York Practice; Normal School or Academy? The Normal School
in 1 866 ; Early View of the Function of a Normal School
B. NORMAL SCHOOLS IN MISSOURI 34
Early Efforts; Joseph Baldwin; Three State Institutions authorized;
Method of Locating Educational Institutions; Changes in Status and in
Scope of Work; 1871-191^; Growth in Numbers; Opposition; Financial
Struggles; Effect of Poverty on the Schools; Relations with Colleges and
Universities
IV. GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL OF MISSOURI NORMAL SCHOOLS
A. THE PRESENT SYSTEM 42
Control First vested in a Single Board; Objections to the Single Board;
Separate Boards — Contemporary Criticism; Attempts to unify the Schools
Educationally; Present Operation of the Separate Boards; Function of a
Board not Understood ; What is the Function of a Board of Regents? Party
Politics in the Boards ; Weakness of the Boards in Material as well as in
Educational Problems; Lack of Unity in Policies affecting the Whole State;
Each School a Law unto Itself; Educational Diversity of the Institutions;
Loss to the Schools of Critical Re vision; The Normal Schools versus the State
University; Sources of Rivalry; Effects of Institutional Competition; The
Local Board System Responsible
B- PROPOSALS FOR A BETTER ORGANIZATION OF PROFESSIONAL TRAINING FOR
TEACHERS 54
Preparation of Teachers a Homogeneous Undertaking; A Reorganized
University; A Professional Board of Executives; Effects of Proposed Re-
iv CONTENTS
organization; The City Training Schools should be included; Voluntary
Cooperation
C. REORGANIZATION OB" STATE EDUCATIONAL CONTROL 63
Principle of Centralization ; The State Unit of Administration; Advantages
of State Control ; Conditions of Successful State Administration ; Unifica-
tion of Control in Missouri; Experiments in Other States; Lessons from
Recent Experience ; Relations of Constituent Departments
V. PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
A. GENERAL FUNCTION 70
1. The Existing Conception. Early Conception of the Function of a Normal
School ; Subsequent Variations ; Special Considerations affecting a Nor-
mal School's Conception of its Function ; Pressure for Academic Credit;
Effect of Local Control; "Democracy" the Justification; Professional
Training long Uncertain as to its Method
2. Normal Schools should train Teachers. Obstacles to Professional Training 78
are Disappearing; Unity of Aim Increasing; A Normal School's Obliga-
tion to the State
B. SCOPE OF ORGANIZATION 8£
1. Historical View, Early Work chiefly for Elementary Teachers ; Prepara-
tion of High School Teachers; Normal Schools and High Schools ; High
Schools and University; Readjustment of Normal Schools for Higher
Instruction; Results of Reorganization
2. How should the Scope of a Normal School's Activities be determined ?ef Stand- 89
ard" Institutions and Others; The Present Policy of Missouri Normal
Schools — Pressure of Local Situation; Example of Other Institutions;
Expansion a Matter of Pride; Personal Expansion; Service of Normal
Schools in enforcing the Idea of Professional Training; Criticism by Uni-
versities partly Ill-founded; The Scope of an Institution's Work should
be determined in View of all the Facts; Organization of Criticism needed
VL PERSONNEL OF THE MISSOUEI NORMAL SCHOOLS
A. TEACHERS 99
Age, Sex, and Parentage ; Educational Equipment; Secondary and Higher
Training — Degrees; Degrees Classified; Geography of Training; Com-
binations of Training; Graduate Degrees; Retardation in Training; Re-
tardation and Graduate Work; Experience; Kind of Experience; Teach-
ing Assignment; Length of Program; What is a Reasonable Load? Good
Teaching as Exacting as Research; Productive Scholarship; Economic
Status — Family and Dependents; Length of Tenure; Salaries — Varia-
tion among the Schools; Comparison with the University; The Best Paid
Groups; Insurance; Teachers at Harris Teachers College
B. STUDENTS 117
Age and Sex — Nationality and Nativity; Parental Occupation and In-
come— Size of Family; Choice of Vocation — Other Teachers in Family;
Financial Attraction; Distance from School; Previous Education; Quality
of the Normal School Student; Comparison of Secondary Training in High
School and in Normal School; Attendance at Colleges and Other Normal
CONTENTS v
Schools; Teaching Experience; Immediate Intentions of Students ; Study
Elsewhere; Students at Harris Teachers College
VII. CUEEICULA OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
A. OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF CURRICULA FOR THE
PREPARATION OF TEACHERS 128
1. Standards of Admission. Professional Subject-matter Well Developed;
Chief Question is One of Purchase and Distribution of Training; Mis-
souri has Temporized with Compromises ; An Adequate Policy Needed ;
Should Preparatory Curricula be Prescribed?
2. Residence Requirements 131
a. Prolonged Preparation Needed for Teachers of All Grades Alike;
Why Longer Training for High School Teaching? Is High School
Instruction More " Advanced"? Social Distinctions implied between
Elementary and High Schools; The Elementary Teacher versus the
High School Teacher; Contrast in Teachers the Chief Obstacle to
Progress; Distinctions in Training should Disappear; The Outlook
for such a Program
6. Adequate Residence Requirements depend upon Prospect of Ex- 139
tended Service ; Service of Women now terminates with Marriage ;
Reasons offered for the Present Practice ; Will the Married Teacher
neglect her Home? Will the Married Woman prove a Less Efficient
Teacher? Marriage an Advantageous Qualification for a Teacher of
Children; Enormous Waste of the Present System; Conservation of
Professional Effort in Europe ; Absence of Organized Effort among
Elementary Teachers in America; Married Teachers would Require
Better Conditions ; Effect of Prolonged Tenure on Training
3. Prescription versus Election of Studies. Definition of Prescription; Theory 144
of *f Equivalence" of Courses for Professional Purposes ; The Professional
Student not Qualified to Elect; Sequence Difficult to Maintain; Is the
Attitude of the Student improved by Election? Effect of Election on
"Initiative"
4. The Extent and Criteria of Curriculum Differentiation 148
a. Incidental versus Organized Professional Training ; Arithmetic ; Other
Elementary Subjects; High School Subjects; Special Curricula in
Normal Schools for High School Teachers;* Advantage of Differen-
tiation.
6. Degree of Differentiation required; Middle and Upper Grades still 153
form a Single Field; Mental and Physical Considerations warrant
Differentiation; Objections to Differentiation; Choice of Service Dif-
ficult; Knowledge too Specialized; Difficulty of Adjusting Supply
and Demand; Character and Extent of Legitimate Differentiation
of Training; Specialized Preparation for Administration; Specialized
Preparation for Rural School Teachers
B. ORGANIZATION OF CUEEICULA IN THE STATE NOBMAL SCHOOLS AND CITY
TEAINING SCHOOLS OF MISSOURI l6l
1, Curricula as Wholes
a. General Characteristics of the Normal School Curricula; Personal
Welfare of the Student placed above Needs of the Service; " Ladder
vi CONTENTS
of Promotion" in Missouri Normal Schools; Effect upon the Schools
Unfortunate
6. Secondary Curriculum Leading to the Rural Certificate; Contradic- 164
tory Aims; Secondary Professional Curricula should be Abolished
c. Collegiate Curricula of the Normal Schools; Not True Curricula; 166
Existing "Curricula*' not Professional
d. Curricula of the City Training Schools; The Harris Teachers College 169
Curriculum for Elementary Teachers; Contrast between State Nor-
mal Schools and City Training Schools; Normal Schools have be-
littled Elementary Instruction; The City Training Schools miss their
Full Opportunity
2. Organization and Content of Specific Courses 17 '2
a. Professional Courses of Secondary Grade 1 73
(1) Subject-matter of the Common School Branches with Emphasis
upon Method; Concentration and Uniform Treatment needed
(2) The Psychology of Learning
(8) Rural Life Problems
(4) Rural School Management
(5) Methods and Observation ; Successful Procedure in Minnesota
J. Professional Courses of Collegiate Grade; Inter-school Variations 177
(1) Psychology; Introductory Course; Advanced Courses in Psychol- 178
ogy; Teaching Less an Applied Science than a Fine Art; Psychol-
ogy Necessary to a Sound View of Education ; Twofold Require-
ment from Psychology; Proposed Organization of Courses in
Psychology
(2) History of Education; Courses offered in Missouri Schools ; Func- 1 84
tion of History of Education in the Professional Preparation of
Teachers ; Suggested Rearrangement of History of Education
(3) General Method and Principles of Teaching; Present Status of 187
"General Method;" Most Advantageous Position of the Course
(4) School Management, Class Management, and School Economy; 190
Relation to Other Subjects
(5) Observation, Participation, and Practice Teaching IQ9,
(a) Size of the Training School as related to Normal School En-
rolment; Control of Local School Facilities Indispensable;
Minimal Standards of Practice Facilities
(&) Housing and Equipment of Training Departments ; Bad Con- 1 97
ditions easily Remedied
(c) Relation between the Training School and Other Normal 199
School Departments; Lack of Cooperation in Missouri Schools ;
Difficulties of Cooperation ; Organized Cooperation
(d) The Apprentice System as related to the Unification of 202
Courses; Defects and Advantages of the System at St. Louis;
Suggested Improvements
(e) Spirit and Morale of the Practice Schools; Reasons for Low 205
Morale; Laissez-faire Policy a Mistake; Training School Tests
show Low Standards
CONTENTS vii
(/) Courses in Observation as Prerequisite to Practice Teaching; 211
Lessons for Demonstration at St. Louis; Courses in Obser-
vation at the Springfield Normal School; Demonstration
Teaching at Warrensburg
(g) Supervision of Practice Teaching
(i) The Supervisory Staff; Ratio of Supervisors to Student-
teachers; Status and Equipment of Supervisors and
Critic Teachers
(ii) Methods of Supervision; Lesson Plans; Inspection of
Class Work; Conferences; Testing Results; Program of
Studies; Should the Practice School experiment with the
Curriculum?
(K) Concentrated versus Distributed Practice Teaching
(*) Most Favorable Position of Practice Teaching in the Curric-
ulum
c. Collegiate Courses in Specific Methods of Teaching; Good Special 225
Method a Function of Subject-matter Courses; "Curriculum" Courses
d. Courses in Academic Subjects 228
(1) English and Public Speaking; Amount and Variety Excessive
for Sound Curricula; Professional Character Negligible; How
should Content Courses be Professionalized?
(2) Ancient Languages 232
(3) Modern Foreign Languages
(4) History and Government
(5) Mathematics 236
(6) Physics and Chemistry 238
(7) Botany, Zoology, Physiology, Hygiene, and Sanitation 239
(8) Geography and Geology 240
(9) Agriculture 240
(10) Fine Arts 242
(11) Commercial Subj ects 243
(12) Manual or Industrial Arts 245
(13) Home Economics 245
(14) Library Economy 246
(15) Physical Training 247
C, THE O.UALITY OF NORMAL SCHOOL TEACHING AS AN ELEMENT IN THE CUR-
RICULUM 247
The Normal School Instructor primarily a Teacher; Characteristics of
Normal School Teaching; Teaching should be Exemplary; The Elements
of Good Teaching; Utilizing Good Models; Stimulating Good Teaching;
Some Form of Educational Criticism Desirable; An ce Educational Ad-
viser;'* Other Solutions
D. SELECTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF CURRICULA 258
1. The Present Situation. Relative Use made of Collegiate Instructors;
Causes of Waste: Duplication of Classes; An Extravagant Elective Sys-
tem ; Lack of Intercollegiate Differentiation ; Concentration of Advanced
viii CONTENTS
Curricula in Latin; Concentration of All High School Curricula; Ad-
vantages of Differentiation; Effect of the Present Policies upon the
Basic Work of the Institutions
2. Number and Kind of Curricula needed in Missouri. Teachers in Rural 265
Schools; Teachers in Graded Elementary Schools; Teachers in High
Schools; How shall this Need be Met?
VIII. OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
A. PRESIDENT AND STAFF $72
1. The President. Modern Conception of a President's Duties; Function 273
of the President in the Missouri Normal Schools ; Effects of the Presi-
dent's Prerogative on the School; Personal Prerogative should be
Limited
2. The Staff. Large Departmental Initiative; Effects of the Elective Sys-
tern on the Teacher; Present Tenure of Position Unjust; Leaves of
Absence for Study or Experience ; Administrative Use of Professional
Training; Departmental Distribution of Training; Departmental Dis-
tribution of Salaries; Secondary versus Collegiate Instructors; Part-
time and Student Assistants; Instructors in the Summer Session; Train-
ing of Summer Instructors; Hours and Salaries of Summer Instruc-
tors ; Contrasting Policies of Summer Session Administration
B. THE STUDENT BODY : SIGNIFICANT FEATURES IN SELECTION, ORGANISATION,
AND ADMINISTRATIVE TREATMENT
1. Men as Normal School Students. Motives in Male Attendance; Reaction
of Male Attendance on the Institution
2. Problem of the Secondary Student. Characteristics of the Extreme Age 295
Groups; Geographical Distribution; Previous Schooling; Opportuni-
ties for High School Attendance; Teaching Experience; Quality of
the Older Secondary Student; Treatment of the Young Secondary
Student; Special Needs of the Older Secondary Student; A State Higli
School
3. Organisation of Attendance. The Problem of Normal School Attend- SOI
ance; Educational Effects of the Present System; Changes in Student
Body from Term to Term; Sequence of Years; Need of Central Ad-
ministration and Favorable Legislation; Opportunity of the Schools
for Independent Action
4. Admission and Classification 307
a. Requirements for Admission; Regulations of Local Boards; Exami-
nation versus " Proving up;" Reorganization of the Secondary Pro-
gram; "Proving up" Policy established; Uniform Administration of
Admission Requirements Needed; What should be the Method of
Admission?
b. Classification of Students; Procedure at Kirksville; Composition of SIS
Classes thus formed; Fixed Curricula the Only Solution
5. Student Programs. Speed the Student's Central Consideration; Much 317
Pressure for Excessive Programs ; Present Practice: Collegiate Pro-
grams; Secondary Programs; Time Required for Preparation; Is the
Standard of Credit in the Normal Schools too Low?
CONTENTS ix
6. Student Rating: Examinations. Selective Function of Ratings; The Prac- 321
tice in Missouri; Comparison with Harris Teachers College; Seasonal
Changes in Student Failure ; Relation of Examinations to Elimination ;
Why the Normal Schools are Non-Selective; Lack of Thorough Exam-
inations a Source of Weakness
7. Administration of Credit Administration of Credit at Kirksville — The 328
Theory; The Practice; Credit for Admission ; Secondary Credit; Colle-
giate Credit ; Time Required for Graduation ; Administration of Credit
at Warrensburg; Administration of Credit at Cape Girardeau; Admin-
istration of Credit at Springfield ; Administration of Credit at Maryville ;
Essentials of Credit Administration
8. Graduation, Certification) and Appointment 344
a. Graduation
b. Certification of Graduates ; Present Form of Certification Inadequate ; 345
Certification should be Specific; Certificates should Issue from One
Source; The Institutions' Share in Certification; Need of a Unified
Administration
c. Appointment of Graduates; Present Method of Recommending 349
Teachers; Demand for Teachers not yet Specialized; Improvements
Needed in System of Appointments; Normal School Responsible for
Teachers in Service
9. The Quality of Normal School Administration as an Element in the Normal 353
School Cumculum
10, Recent Changes in the Institutions 354
IX. PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL 357
A. NORMAL SCHOOL GRADUATES OF 1915 357
Relation of Salaries to Training; Normal School Students at the University
B. NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENTS AMONG THE TEACHING POPULATION 36l
1. Teachers in Rural Schools
2. Teachers and Supervisors in Graded Elementary Schools 364
a. The State at Large; Conditions of Training; Conditions of Reward
6. St. Louis and Kansas City 368
3. Teachers and Supervisors in High Schools 372
a. The State at Large
b. St. Louis and Kansas City 375
4. City and Town Superintendents . 376
5. County Superintendents 379
C. WHAT HAVE THE NORMAL SCHOOLS DONE FOR THE STATE? 380
Normal Schools most Effective in Small Communities; Normal School In-
fluence Widespread but Vague ; Good Teachers Impossible at the Present
Economic Level
X- LINCOLN INSTITUTE 385
XL SUMMARY OF PROPOSALS FOR THE PREPARATION OF MISSOURI TEACHERS IN
NORMAL SCHOOLS 387
Purpose of the Proposals
CONTENTS
A. CONCLUSIONS AND PROPOSALS EELATING TO EXTERNAL ORGANIZATION AND
CONTROL 388
1. Constitutional Modifications
%. Legislative Provisions
3. Administrative Policies of the Board $90
B. CONCLUSIONS AND PROPOSALS RELATING TO INTERNAL ORGANIZATION AND
PROCEDURE 391
1. Purpose and Scope of Normal School Effort
2. The Curricula
a. Outstanding Problems of Curriculum Construction
b. Organization of Secondary Curricula
c. Organization of Collegiate Curricula
d. Quality of Normal School Instruction as a Factor in the Curriculum.
e. Selection and Distribution of Curricula
3. Staff of Instruction 395
a. The Presidents
b. The Teachers
4. The Student Body 39®
APPENDIX
§ I. COLLECTION AND TREATMENT OF DATA
A. The Normal Schools 401
B. The Teaching Population 405
§ II. CURRICULA
TABLE 1. Collegiate Courses offered in Missouri State Normal Schools, 1917-18 406
TABLE 2. Collegiate Offerings in various Normal School Departments; 1937-1 8 41 1
TABLE 3. Individual Curricula illustrative of the Operation of the Elective System
in Missouri Normal Schools (10 cases) 41 1
TABLE 4. City Training School Curricula
A. The Harris Teachers College Curriculum for Kindergartners 417
B. The Kansas City Teacher-training Curriculum 418
§111. DATES OF THE FIRST ESTABLISHMENT OF STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS 418
§ IV. NORMAL SCHOOL TEACHERS
TABLE 5. Age and Sex Distribution 419
TABLE 6. Occupation of Father 41 9
TABLE 7. Number of Other Teachers in the Family 419
TABLE 8. A. Degrees and Class of Institution from which they were received 4SO
B. Degrees held by Teachers at the Normal Schools,, at the Soldan High
School in St. Louis, and at the State University
TABLE 9. Degrees held by Teachers in Various Normal School Departments 421
TABLE 10. Sources of Degrees
CONTENTS xi
TABLE 11. Combinations of Training ' 422
TABLE 12. Total Teaching Experience 422
TABLE IS. Combinations of Teaching Experience 423
TABLE 14. Varieties of Teaching Experience 423
TABLE 15. Distribution of Annual Salaries,, 1915-16 423
TABLE 16. Departmental Salaries, 1915-16 424
TABLE 17. Length of Weekly Programs, 1915-16 425
TABLE 18. Salaries of Normal School Teachers according to their Grade of Work,
1915-16 425
TAB!E 1 9- Extent of Secondary Work reported by the forty-one best trained Nor-
mal School Teachers, 1915-16 425
TABLE 20. Training of eighty-one Teachers who taught only in the Summer Ses-
sion, 1916 426
TABLE 21. Salary and Hours of ninety-three Summer Instructors, 191 6 427
§ V. NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENTS
TABLE 22. A. Classification of the Total Enrolment, 1913-14 428
J3. "Standard" Enrolment, 1913-14 428
TABLE 23. Proportion of Men in Various Normal School Classifications, 1913-14 428
TABLE 24. Changes in the Proportion of Men Students since 1871 428
TABLE 25. Proportion of Secondary Enrolment, 1913-14 429
TABLE 26. Age Distribution of Total Enrolment, 1913-14 429
TABLE 27. Nationality of Parents 429
TABLE 28. Father's Occupation 430
TABLE 29. Father's Income 431
TABLE 30. " Is teaching the best paid employment you could conveniently under-
take?" 431
TABLE 31. "Are you self-dependent in paying for your education?" 431
TABLE 32. Size of Family 431
TABLE 33. Other Teachers in the Family 432
TABLE 34. "How many of your family ever attended a normal school?' 432
TABLE 35. High School Attendance 432
TABLE 36. Ratings of 871 High School Graduates
A. Ratings of Ability distributed among Occupations 432
B. Ratings of Ability distributed within Occupational Groups 433
TABLE 37. Comparison of Collegiate Ratings at Normal Schools of Students pre-
pared at High Schools with Ratings of Students prepared at the Normal Schools 433
TABLE 38. Proportion of Students reporting Teaching Experience 433
TABLE 39. Distribution of Teaching Experience 433
TABLE 40. " Do you plan to teach permanently?" 434
TABLE 41. Kind of Teaching sought by those intending to Teach immediately
upon leaving the Normal School 434
TABLE 42, Programs Scheduled by All Collegiate Students in 191S-14 434
TABLE 43. Programs Scheduled by All Secondary Students in 1913-14 435
TABLE 44. Distribution of Student Grades, 1913-14 435
xii CONTENTS
TABLE 45. Seasonal Variation in Collegiate Student Failure, 1913-14 435
TABLE 46. Size of Normal School Classes, 1915-16 436
TABLE 47. Proportions of Large and Small Classes in Various Departments, 1915—
16 436
TABLE 48. Number of Four-year Bachelor's Degrees from Missouri State Normal
Schools • 437
TABLE 49- Subsequent Employment of Recipients of Normal School Certificates
in 1915 437
TABLE 50. Distribution of Recipients of Diplomas or Certificates in 1915 by Classes
among their Various Subsequent Occupations , 438
§ VI. TEACHING POPULATION
TABLE 51. Teachers in Graded Elementary Schools, 1915. Duration of Normal
School Attendance 438
TABLE 52. Teachers in Graded Elementary Schools, 1915. Proportion of Terms
spent at each Normal School in Collegiate Work 438
TABLE 53. Teachers in Graded Elementary Schools, 1915. Distribution of Terms
of Collegiate Normal School Attendance 438
TABLE 54. Teachers in Graded Elementary Schools, 1915. Number reporting Col-
legiate Work at Normal Schools with average number of Terms of Attendance 439
TABLE 55. Teachers in Graced Elementary Schools, 1915. High School Prepara-
tion of 1556 Teachers who had attended State Normal Schools 439
TABLE 56. High School Teachers, 1915 (except St. Louis and Kansas City). Dis-
tribution of Collegiate Training 439
TABLE 57. High School Teachers, 1915 (except St. Louis and Kansas City). Dis-
tribution of Normal School Training 439
TABLE 58. Subjects taught by Missouri High School Teachers and Supervisors,
1916-17 440
§ VII. BIENNIAL STATE EXPENDITURES FOE NORMAL SCHOOLS, 1871-1918 441
§ VIIL THE JUDGMENT OF EXPERIENCED TEACHERS AS TO THE VALUE OF VARIOUS
ELEMENTS IN THEIR TRAINING 442
§ IX. THE RESULTS OF STANDARD TESTS IN THE ELEMENTARY TRAINING DEPART-
MENTS OF MISSOURI STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS AND IN THE EXPERIMENTAL
SCHOOL AT THE STATE UNIVERSITY 445
TABLE 59. Number of Pupils by Schools and Grades 445
TABLE 60. Median Ages of Pupils by Grades 445
TABLE 6l. Number and Per Cent of Pupils Two or more Years Retarded 445
TABLE 62. Number and Per Cent of Pupils Two or more Years Accelerated 446
TABLE 63. Speed of Addition 446
TABLE 64. Accuracy of Addition 447
TABLE 65. Speed of Subtraction 447
TABLE 66. Accuracy of Subtraction 447
TABLE 67. Speed of Multiplication 448
TABLE 68. Accuracy of Multiplication 448
CONTENTS xiii
TABLE 69. Speed of Division 448
TABLE 70. Accuracy of Division 448
TABLE 71. Comparison of Ranks in Courtis Tests , 449
TABLE 72. Median Scores in Stone Reasoning Test 449
TABLE 73. Spelling of Words from the Ayres List 449
TABLE 74. Spelling of Words from the Boston List 450
TABLE 75. Speed of Handwriting 450
TABLE 76. Quality of Handwriting 451
TABLE 77. Kansas Silent Reading Tests' 451
TABLE 78. Speed of Silent Reading 452
TABLE 79. Reproduction of Passage Read 452
TABLE 80. Answers to Questions on Passage Read 452
TABLE 81. Compositions 453
TABLE 82. Summary of Ranks given Each School 453
TABLE 83. Progress of Training Schools from Grade to Grade in certain selected
Abilities 455
TABLE 84. Joint Performance of Training Schools in Courtis Tests 455
TABLE 85. Correlations b6tween certain Abilities measured in the Tests 456
INDEX 457
PREFACE
THIS Study of the Preparation of Teachers for the Public Schools originated in
an official request made to the Carnegie Foundation by the Governor of Mis-
souri in July, 1914. Governor Major defined the problem of the state with respect
to its teachers in the following words :
"One of the chief problems confronting this and other states is a wholesome sup-
ply of adequately- trained and prepared teachers. In this matter Missouri has made
great progress during the last eighteen months. We have a great university and five
splendid normal schools, and teachers' training courses in about 75 high schools. The
question, however, is ever open as to what is the best preparation and what is the
duty of the State in meeting it, and how can the State secure the greatest benefit at
a minimum expense."
The enquiry undertaken by the Carnegie Foundation with the cooperation of many
students of education began with an examination of the agencies for the training of
teachers in the State of Missouri as thus enumerated. A study of these agencies, how-
ever, inevitably disclosed a more far-reaching problem, and led to an attempt to eval-
uate the process itself whereby teachers are prepared, and to an effort to formulate
trustworthy principles of procedure. This development of the scope of the enquiry has
modified the undertaking in certain important particulars: first, attention has been
concentrated on the normal schools, inasmuch as they represent the professional prob-
lem of teacher-training in its simplest form ; second, instead of a report addressed only
to legislators and to lay readers generally, the study has come to include a somewhat
technical discussion of the fundamental considerations that enter into the organiza-
tion and conduct of the courses of study intended for teacher-training ; and third, in-
stead of a short bulletin, there has necessarily resulted a volume sufficiently large to
admit of the treatment of these professional topics. Throughout the report there is
woven a discussion of the statutory and administrative conditions in the Missouri in-
stitutions for the training of teachers; and the general treatment has been greatly
illuminated by an intensive study of the elements of the Missouri teaching popula-
tion with which the problem of teacher-training is most concerned.
While the present report, therefore, is confined to a discussion of the normal school
and its function, its curriculum, and its capabilities for the preparation of teachers
for the different grades of schools, it will necessarily be supplemented by a second
report, dealing with an examination of teacher preparation in colleges and universi-
ties. This could scarcely be based upon the study of a single institution in one state.
In the Introduction to the report, not only is the evolution of the study made
clear, but also detailed reference is made to the teachers and writers on education who
have participated in its preparation. This includes many representatives of normal
schools, colleges, and universities, men. whose opinions have been formed upon actual
experience as well as upon long study of the problem. The result which is here laid
xvi PREFACE
before students of education is, therefore, the outcome of the coordinated effort of a
considerable body of skilled professional men.
Outside of the information contained in the Introduction, certain aspects of the
report may be mentioned from the standpoint of the Carnegie Foundation itself.
The various bulletins dealing with educational subjects that have been issued by
the Carnegie Foundation in the last dozen years may be grouped in two classes. To
the first class belong bulletins of a professional character addressed to members of
the profession concerned. Such was the bulletin printed in 1910 on Medical Education
in the United States and Canada, which was addressed immediately to teachers and
practitioners of medicine. In the second group of bulletins are included those which
are aimed to state in simple and clear form educational questions and results generally
known to professional men, but whose knowledge is not widespread outside of the
profession itself. Such a bulletin is that just issued entitled " Justice and the Poor,"
which seeks to convey to the intelligent layman a clear statement of the causes thru
which a denial of justice to the poor has oftentimes resulted not by any intention
of the law, but because the administration of the law has not kept up with its intent.
The present report belongs to the first group of bulletins. It is addressed to the
men and women who are working in a distinct professional field, namely, that of teach-
ing— a much larger field than that of medicine. No teacher in the elementary or sec-
ondary or normal schools, or in the school of education of a college or university, can
fail to be interested in the effort to do what has been attempted in this report. It
represents the first comprehensive formulation of good practice in the largest field
of professional training for public service in our country, and it is believed that the
work has been done with such care that the results here set forth are worthy of the
thoughtful study of every earnest and intelligent teacher.
It will be evident to the reader that this exceedingly important task has had a
most sympathetic handling even tho the treatment has necessarily been critical in
method. In spite of widely differing training and experience, the authors have been
singularly unanimous in their conclusions. Aside from the inevitable peculiarity of
their individual points of view, their examination of the situation has been as com-
pletely unbiased and disinterested as it was possible to make it. Their commission
from the Foundation centred in a true statement and a reasonable interpretation of
the facts, however familiar or however novel the results ; and their conclusions indicate
this. For example, as urged in the earlier reports of the Foundation, there appears
here to be no reason why tax-supported normal schools should not give themselves
unreservedly to the great business of properly preparing teachers. On the other hand,
bhe contention between normal school and college as to which shall prepare high school
teachers — a dispute that previously seemed important — now appears superficial.
The Carnegie Foundation has had no preconceived theory to promulgate. It has, in-
leed, never committed itself to any pronouncement concerning normal schools beyond
,he mere assumption that it is the duty of the normal school to train teachers.
PREFACE xvii
This report makes clear that what is really needed is not arbitrary distinctions as
between normal schools and colleges,, but an enlightened administration of the state's
entire teacher- training function exercised from a single directing body equipped to
prepare teachers for all schools as thoroughly as possible. No man or woman faces
a harder task than that which confronts the untrained teacher who essays to teach
others that which he has himself never learned. Nothing goes so far to reduce a pro-
fession to the level of the commonplace as the lack of a background of knowledge
and of professional spirit in its members.
To-day in the elementary schools of the nation, and particularly in the rural
schools, the American woman is carrying the heavy load of public school teaching.
In every state of the Union young women are teaching whose formal education never
went beyond one year of high school, who receive little assistance or encouragement
from the school authorities, and yet who, out of native ability and enthusiasm, thru
hard work and the saving grace of a wholesome sense of proportion, become true
teachers. Seldom does a community give credit to the brave womanly figure that
carries on its slender shoulders so heavy a responsibility. But it is idle with the re-
stricted preparation, the lack of sympathetic counsel, and the scant pay that are the
characteristics of elementary school teaching to-day, to expect such heroic service ex-
cept in a limited number of cases. The aim of each state should be to work toward
a situation where the teacher in the elementary and secondary schools shall possess
a training that is adequate and a professional recognition that will attract and satisfy
the aspirations and the economic needs of able men and women. To open the door to
a finer preparation for the life of a teacher and to put this profession on a plane of
the highest honor and dignity is fundamental to any true progress in education for
our country.
To attain this is only in part a matter of cost and of the teacher's salary. One "cannot
go out in the market with any sum of money, however large, and buy good teaching.
An adequate army of sincere, able, and thoughtful teachers can be recruited only
from a people who discriminate between that which is sincere and that which is su-
perficial and insincere. Education in a democracy, to serve its real purpose, must be
an education of the whole people. The school reacts on the body politic and the ideals
of the democracy react on the school. An honest and thorough system of public
schools, manned by able and well-trained teachers, can only arise among a people
who themselves believe in honesty and thoroughness.
It must be confessed that the most striking weakness of American political, social,
and economic thinking lies in the superficial character of our education. In our pub-
lic schools, and no less in our universities and colleges, education is interpreted only
too often to mean a smattering of knowledge in many things; seldom is it construed
in terms of mastery of any one subject or as the ability to think clearly. Our schools
reflect the almost universal superficiality of our people, and our citizenship is edu-
cated to the ideal of superficiality in our schools. Inhere is no end to these mutual
xviii PREFACE
reactions except an aroused public opinion that will demand sincere teaching and a
body of teachers who will educate the children of the nation to the ideals of simpli-
city, sincerity, and thoroughness. An honest system of education and a clear-thinking
public opinion must be developed together. This is the fundamental problem of a
democracy.
Finally, one cannot forget that since this report was undertaken the whole prob-
lem of education in our country, as in all countries, has received a new emphasis,
and has been subjected to a new scrutiny. The letter of the Governor of Missouri,
out of which this study arose, was dated July 18, 1914. Two weeks later Europe had
entered upon the great war which was later to involve the United States as well.
This report appears after the actual armed conflict has ceased, but at the very mo-
ment when our country is face to face with the necessity of evaluating anew its system
of education. Economic no less than social conditions are upon a new basis. Within
the last year and a half the value of the teacher's salary — often more properly called
wages — has been cut in half by the rise in the cost of living. Along with the demand
of the moment for an improved and inspiring system of public schools, we are con-
fronted with a situation in which the best teachers are rapidly withdrawing from the
profession. The country faces a real crisis in its educational development, and the
passing of that crisis depends mainly on the possibility of training and bringing into
the schools teachers fitted for their high task. The whole problem of the service of the
schools themselves hangs absolutely upon the ability to dbtain the requisite supply
of devoted, able, and well-prepared teachers.
In such a situation there is need for preserving a true perspective. The American
people do not intend that the schools shall be made the victims of any sudden dis-
turbance. The public, when it understands the situation, will be ready to pay the price
for good teachers, but it should also be clearly apprehended that a mere raise of pay
of the future public school teachers, whether in the rural schools or in the city schools,
is but a partial solution of the problem. The teacher must have before him a career
that will attract the high-minded and ambitious student. He must be able to earn
in that career a living salary and one that will provide for his comfort and for his
protection in old age, but that is only one of the conditions to be fulfilled. Before
all else we must have in our minds a clear knowledge of what good teaching is, of
the methods by which teachers may be fitted for their calling, and under what super-
vision and organization the schools shall be conducted in order that the intellectual,
social, and spiiitual aspirations of teachers may be realized for the common good.
Above and beyond all considerations of salary, it is necessary to have among teach-
ers the spirit which rises out of professional training — adequate, scholarly, devoted
and which will make all who breathe its atmosphere proud to belong to a profession
where such qualifications are widespread and recognized features. Without such a con-
dition, no mere horizontal raise of salary will transform our schools into places of true
instruction for children and for youth.
PREFACE xix
It is the purpose of this report to point the way not only to better financial rec-
ognition of the teacher's service and to make clear to the public its duties in this
respect, but still more to emphasize the need for that professional conception of
ability, of knowledge, and of preparation which must characterize the teachers' equip-
ment before the schools can become the effective agency in civilization which they
aim to be.
HENRY S. PEITCHETT.
January, 1920.
THE PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION OF TEACHERS
FOR AMERICAN PUBLIC SCHOOLS
INTRODUCTION
A, CHARACTER AND CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ENQ.UIRY
THE present Bulletin, the fourteenth in the Foundation's series of educational pub-
lications, contains the first section of a study begun more than five years ago. In
July, 1914, the Carnegie Foundation received from the Governor of the State of
Missouri, Elliott W. Major, an invitation to consider the problem of the "supply
of adequately trained and prepared teachers" in that state, with reference especially
to the question, "What is the best preparation and what is the duty of the state in
meeting it, and how can the state secure the greatest benefit at a minimum expense ?"
The proposal for an examination into the preparation of teachers for American
public schools had received serious consideration at various times since the educa-
tional studies of the Foundation were first undertaken. The problem was found to
differ materially from that of legal or medical education, in that the preparation of
teachers involves much larger numbers, is much more local in character, and depends
more directly on state authority for its management. The conclusion had at length
been reached that the only satisfactory treatment of the problem at present would be
one that approached it as primarily a state enterprise.
The invitation from Missouri was therefore accepted by the Foundation, and the
enquiry was formally inaugurated at a conference held at Jefferson City, Missouri, on
November 28, 1914. Here, at the Governor's request, the President of the Founda-
tion met about one hundred of the leading workers in the schools, normal schools,
and colleges of the state, and discussed with them the proposed study, receiving, at
the close of the conference, their unanimous endorsement and pledge of cooperation
in the undertaking.
The enquiry was projected in two main divisions. The first was to consist of a
careful examination of all the various institutions in the state engaged in preparing
teachers for the public schools. The report which follows embodies a part of the
results of this phase of the work as explained more fully below. The second division
contemplated a census of the teachers of the state. It was proposed to make this as
nearly complete as possible in order to determine the actual characteristics of the
teaching population with reference to its training, and to secure data from which
effectively to analyze the problem of teacher supply. The response to this endeavor
was highly satisfactory; and data were secured from more than four-fifths of the
twenty thousand teachers in the public schools. The results have been studied with
care, and will be published in detail in a separate bulletin having as its central topic
the relations between a state, as represented in its official department of education,
and the entire body of teachers in its service.
It was at first expected that the institutional study could be presented as a whole
in a single volume, but it soon became evident that a sectional treatment wottld be
4 THE PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION OF TEACHERS
necessary if justice were to be done even to a few selected aspects of the subject.
Thus the first question suggested in the Governor's invitation, "What is the best
preparation ?" immediately assumed formidable dimensions, and an attempt was made
quite independent of the Missouri study to formulate a theory of the preparation
of teachers, together with concrete applications in terms of specific curricula,, that
would be acceptable to the leading students in that field all over the country. This
set of theses and provisional curricula was issued early in 1917, and elicited an ex-
traordinary amount of valuable comment and criticism from representative sources
— material which is now being worked over for a revised edition of these proposals.
In like manner a consideration of the problems found to be uppermost in the
normal schools on the one hand and in the universities and colleges on the other,
suggested that separate treatment was advisable, altho fundamentally the two sets
of institutions have much in common and, judging by present indications, are rap-
idly approaching an identical conception of their task in so far as the preparation
of teachers is concerned. Consequently the efforts of the college and university to
provide professional training in education have been postponed for later considera-
tion, and the present discussion is concerned solely with the state and city normal
schools; except as the questions of government and control, curriculum organization,
and some-others, necessarily involve all state institutions engaged in this work.
Even with this restriction it was found to be impossible to include within reason-
able limits an examination of all features, or even of all important features, of normal
school activity. To many it will appear difficult to justify the omission of any refer-
ence to housing or material equipment. Still more would probably regard a study of
normal school financing, here omitted, as of greater importance than many topics
that have been discussed, while much might have been said concerning extra-mural
activities such as correspondence study, extension lectures, and other field service for
which no place has been found.
Whether well or ill advised, the determining policy in the selection of topics has
been to consider those phases of a school's life that bear most directly upon its edu-
cational procedure and success. An institution's per capita costs may have no con-
sistent relation to its real performance, and a luxurious plant may house an unsat-
isfactory educational philosophy. Granted, however, a sound purpose and a know-
ledge of tested and successful procedure, an institution or a state may usually be
trusted not to attempt more than its funds will permit it to do well. For this reason
it is primarily the educational significance of a given scheme of organization and of its
administrative working-out that should be subjected to careful and periodical review.
It was believed, moreover, that such a treatment would not only prove most help-
ful to Missouri, but would be of the greatest service elsewhere as well. The purposes
for which teachers should be especially trained are virtually the same throughout the
country, and it is greatly in the interests of our national solidarity to make this
identity complete and emphatic. By virtue of this common purpose institutional
INTRODUCTION 5
experience everywhere may be utilized in gradually building up legitimate stand-
ards of practice whereby any single institution may measure itself or be measured
by others. It is to such common elements in the educational problems presented that
this study has addressed itself. There are few of the situations here presented as
occurring in Missouri that have not appeared in quite as acute form in many other,
perhaps most, American states, and it is hoped that this more than local application
may considerably enhance whatever merit the bulletin may possess.
B. METHOD AND PERSONNEL
The study was organized and conducted by Dr. William S. Learned, of the Foun-
dation staff. Dr. I. L. Kandel reviewed the report and contributed the account of the
rise of normal schools outside of Missouri. At every stage of the enquiry the expe-
rience in such studies of the President of the Foundation, Dr. Henry S. Pritchett,
and of the Secretary, Dr. Clyde Furst, has been freely drawn upon.
Dr. William C. Bagley, Director of the School of Education at the University of
Illinois when the study was begun, and now Professor of Education at Teachers
College, Columbia University, was asked to make a special study of normal school
curricula. Dr. Bagley has had extensive experience in elementary school work as well
as in normal schools in both eastern and western parts of the country; he is responsi-
ble for most of the sections discussing the curricula and for innumerable helpful sug-
gestions throughout the book.
The other participants in the study as a whole were Dr. Charles A. McMurry,
Professor of Elementary Education at George Peabody College for Teachers, for-
merly director of the training department at the Illinois State Normal University
and at the Northern Illinois State Normal School; and Dr. George D. Strayer, Pro-
fessor of Educational Administration at Teachers College, Columbia University,
and late President of the National Education Association. These gentlemen, altho
already familiar with the Missouri institutions, visited them again for the present
purpose, and their findings are embodied in the report.
Important use has been made at many points in the text of the statistics secured
from teachers in service in the state. The work of assembling and collating these has
been in charge of Mr. Homer W. Josselyn, previously Associate Professor of School
Administration in the University of Kansas.
A specific contribution of much significance for its purpose was furnished by
Dr. Walter F. Dearborn, Professor of Education at Harvard University. With the
help of specially trained assistants from his department, Dr. Dearborn carried out
an extensive series of measurements of various forms of school Achievement in the
training classes of the five normal schools. These tests supplied an indispensable
check upon the judgments of the observers, with which they tallied to a surprising
degree. The main results are printed in the Appendix.
6 THE PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION OF TEACHERS
Aside from the persons mentioned above, many others have rendered valuable aid
as the study progressed, either by way of experienced judgment and advice or skilled
technical assistance. Special acknowledgment is due to Mrs. Dorothy R. Roberts, to
whom fell the arduous task of verifying and editing the mass of tabular material on
which much of the study rests.
Of the method followed in the enquiry it may be said that it has been the inten-
tion to base conclusions only upon a first-hand knowledge of all the facts, wherever
this was obtainable. All of the observers did considerable field work in the state,
some of them spending several months there; personal written reports were made to
them by practically every normal school instructor, and by three-fourths of the stu-
dents in attendance when the schools were visited; many classes were attended, and
personal interviews were had with a large number both of teachers and of students;
the school records were carefully examined, and in many cases were verified by grad-
uates. Conditions affecting the normal schools in the state at large were judged by
an extended visit to the Ozark region, by interviews with many county superintend-
ents and written reports from each one in the state, and by personal visits and inter-
views with the superintendents in the twenty-five largest cities of the state and
written reports from nearly all the rest* The colleges of the Missouri college union
were visited, and while the data collected from them 4re not contained in this por-
tion of the report, these visits threw considerable light upon the work of the normal
schools and upon educational conditions at large.
In the great number of facts and impressions thus gathered the authors have tried
to distinguish the essential features of the institutional situation as they found it,
tracing it, so far as possible, to the earlier conditions that had produced it The
catalogues and bulletins of all the schools from their establishment, and especially
the annual reports of the State Superintendent of Public Schools from 1867 on, fur-
nished a gratifying amount of material for a genetic treatment of this sort. The
progress of the schools since they were examined in 1915 and 1916 has not been
followed except in certain isolated details. The study was considered to have value
not as giving a minute and complete account of certain institutions, but rather as
an interpretation of the educational significance of a certain order of organization
and administration caught as nearly as might be in cross section. Moreover, the most
striking changes that have taken place since the schools were visited are due to ab-
normal conditions, consequent upon the war, and have an unnatural relation to what
went before; there would be little point in describing these.
The spirit of the enquiry is of course critical, as befits any serious examination
of arrangements intended to modify the education of a free people; any other atti-
tude is obviously inconsistent with a true conception of public service. Nevertheless
it would be impossible to frame or make headway with proposals for improvement
without a sympathetic appreciation of conditions as they exist. Such an appreciation
was facilitated to an unusual degree by the hearty and intelligent co5peration of
INTRODUCTION 7
the men and women in the normal schools. With the rarest exceptions these work-
ers met thei representatives of the study apparently without other thought than to
show clearly the real nature of their problems, and to aid in arriving at just and
effective conclusions. It is to their aid that the authors are chiefly indebted. Without
exaggeration, the normal school teachers themselves could be regarded as the authors
of a large portion of the report, and if it has been urged therein that the develop-
ment of the educational policies of the schools be entrusted in much greater measure
to the abler teachers, it is because this conclusion has grown out of immediate contact
with the persons available for such responsibilities.
C. A GENERAL STATEMENT OF CONCLUSIONS
DEMOCRACY AND EDUCATION
The subject of the present study is of surpassing importance to a democracy. An
attempt has been made to describe and appraise the efforts of an American common-
wealth to provide itself with suitable instructors for its youthful population. It will
be generally admitted that the teachers of children and youth, while not the sole in-
struments, are by far the most influential instruments thru which a people may con-
sciously control its future; that they directly determine in great part both the extent
and the degree to which sound fundamental ideas pervade, unite, and move a people.
The significance of an enquiry as to how those teachers are chosen and prepared is
therefore apparent.
Furthermore, the importance of such a study is vastly increased at a time when the
whole democratic scheme of life is emerging from a struggle with an opposing world-
order that exhibits a singularly effective tho misdirected social organization. As an
outcome of the conflict a sincere democracy is compelled to consider how it may ex-
change its earlier forms and institutions for more adequate expressions of its own
cherished ideals ; how it shall acquire the power for orderly and masterful action rising
out of a clear national purpose, and combine this with its passion for freedom, truth,
and justice in individual relations. The democratic conception of society has grown
slowly by the groping application of a few fundamental notions, and is as yet scarcely
more than in bud; its full bloom into a stable world-order promises a thrilling spec-
tacle in which America may participate with great effect. What is the central con-
dition, if there be such, on which this epoch-making development depends?
As a necessary means of self-preservation the consciously directed spread of true
ideas has long been an admitted principle of democratic government; general intelli-
gence has been ftimlj felt to be one of its objects, and the school has been accepted
as a proper instrument thereto. But as the most effectual means for ensuring human
safety, welfare, and growth; as the one defence against elements that would ruin the
whole apparatus of orderly progress; and consequently as the central policy of ademo-
cratic organization, the wide diffusion of a high Degree < of intelligence has been
8 THE PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION OF TEACHERS
neglected to the,present day. This is the task which now confronts us. The condition
that will determine the successful development of a genuine democracy in America
rests in our willingness to establish, as our foremost policy of public action, a popu-
lar education that is substantial and unequivocal.
Universal compulsory education, tho far from achieved, is a familiar slogan for
which we make a brave stand; but to the duration and content of this education, and
to the means used in providing it, we have paid little attention- Longer to counte-
nance this delusion is to fail in our great experiment. Free and true ideas important
to human welfare must be brought skilfully and vividly, and thru a prolonged period,
not to prospective leaders only, as some would have it, but to every child and youth.
To have this contact is his right as a candidate for membership in a democratic
society; to profit by it must be made his primary obligation. Even our theory of
universal education has hitherto been satisfied with a scanty offering formally pre-
sented and often properly declined; to pass it around to all was our main ambition.
Henceforth, the state must assume responsibility for the product in the case of each
normal individual from the beginning well thru adolescence. Hitherto, if each child
attended a school for a few weeks in the year, it has been considered that the require-
ment was met; hereafter, it is indispensable that each child develop into what shall
be, according to his abilities, an educated person, or show why that is impossible.
EDUCATION AND THE TEACHER
This shift in education from a nominally universal to a substantial basis involves
preeminently and almost exclusively the teacher. So far as the state can provide educa-
tion, the teacher is the substance of it. The measure of our past and present deficiency
is startlingly revealed by the manner in which we have persistently evaded this fact.
Education has been much, and on the whole reverently, on our lips, but so little
have we grasped its purport that the sole factor which can give it reality and mean-
ing, namely, the teacher, is grossly ill-equipped, ill-rewarded, and lacking in distinc-
tion. A school system with us is an elaborate hierarchical device that undertakes
thru successive gradations of textbook makers, superintendents, principals, and super-
visors to isolate and prepare each modicum of knowledge and skill so that it may
safely be entrusted to the humble teacher at the bottom, who is drilled for a few
weeks only, if at all, in directions for administering it ultimately to the child. Mean-
while superintendents and school boards publicly measure their success by numbers
enrolled, by buildings and material equipment added, and by multiplied kinds of
schooling introduced; and the people are taught to accept this as education. Such
perversions are ample comment on the thoughtlessness of our formula. The school
authorities are rare who by enlightened and fearless propaganda have convinced their
public that education consists first of all in the superior quality and skill of its in-
dividual teachers, and is otherwise meaningless.
Veritable education, as contrasted with the present dependence upon estimates by
INTRODUCTION 9
bulk and housing, signifies a complete transformation in the character and status of
the teaching profession. Such a transformation once properly accomplished, the other
necessary modifications will inevitably take care of themselves. America, with its hun-
dred millions of people, needs upward of three-quarters of a million men and women
to represent her with the childhood and youth of the nation in a deliberate and thor-
ough educative process. If wars are to cease and democracy is permanently to hold the
field, it will be a democracy with sufficient wisdom to confide this, its most respon-
sible task, to its most competent citizens, and to prepare them thoroughly for its safe
discharge. Genuine education, in a sense consistent with any honest vision of its mean-
ing, can proceed only thru immediate contact with keen minds fully informed and per-
suaded of what the rising generation may become, and dedicated to such achievement.
Persons so equipped will in general not be had unless the distinguished rewards and
opportunities of life are attainable thru teaching careers. Moreover, these careers
must not be mere avenues of promotion, as in notable cases to-day, but must con-
stitute and be recognized as opportunities for achievement in themselves. Any other
course means simply to exploit the future in the interest of the present by abandon-
ing its control to second-rate minds. Plato^s provision that the head of the state be
the director of education expresses the unavoidable perspective in a completed de-
mocracy.1
NEW STANDARDS ESSENTIAL FOE GENUINE EDUCATION
Marked changes must ensue in our present system of schooling if we undertake to
carry out an honest interpretation of our avowed aim of "universal education*" by
making it not only universal but also education. In the first place our elementary and
secondary school systems must be thoroughly integrated into one homogeneous and
indivisible unit — a varied but coherent twelve-year career for mind and body,
whereby, as a youth, each citizen may acquire a certificate of the health, intelligence,
and character that underlie a successful society.
This done, distinctions of training, experience, and salary among teaching positions
within this unit must also disappear. Proper training for teaching the third grade
should be as prolonged and as serious as training for teaching the tenth or twelfth
grade, and should be equally well rewarded. To pass childhood thru a graded quality
of instruction in order finally to place those who survive in charge of real teachers
only at the top is a blunder that explains more of the dire results noticeable in our
schools than we dare acknowledge.
If the status of all teachers, upper and lower, urban and rural, is to be approxi-
mately the same in an honestly equipped school system, what shall that status be?
The standards of preparation cannot well be lower in amount than those now de-
manded for superior secondary instruction. Four years of well-directed training sub-
1 The State of Vermont already has the enviable distinction of paying its commissioner of education more than any
other state official, including the governor.
10 THE PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION OF TEACHERS
sequent to a high school education is sufficient, with selected material, to lay the foun-
dations of a superior teacher. Experience, skilled practical guidance, and further spe-
cialized study, attended always by discriminating selection, should result in a group
having relatively high mental and social power and fit to serve any community as
leaders. For to lead youth effectively implies, by any acceptable definition, the power
and resources required to lead the community also.
On the other hand, if training of any sort can provide men and women who are
equipped and willing to serve youth as youth should be served, their service is pre-
eminent. To the individual parent, as to the state, it is quite the most appealing good,
after physical health; and it is altogether a more difficult service than any other to
render well. Teachers that approach such a standard of work, therefore, will require
the recognition and rewards commensurate with it. This is a test of shifted values that
can be met in America with the greatest ease. No question of obligation to a class is
involved; it is a case simply of an enlightened democracy purchasing for the future
goods that shall make it great. Billions cheerfully spent for defending and extend-
ing liberty abroad are a challenge, whatever the cost, to broaden and make sound the
foundations of liberty at home.
In the schools the attainment of such a standard would modify many things. The
present methods and attitudes of supervision would disappear; its hierarchy would
be transformed. Organization would, of course, remain, but the pupil would meet di-
rectly and constantly a well-selected and tested leader prepared to speak with per-
sonal effect and to win response by virtue of trained intelligence. Such leaders, instead
of taking minute orders from higher officers, would themselves assume the responsi-
bility, in joint action, for the conduct and development of instruction — the life-
long business of capable minds. In other words, education would become ajint-hand
process by skilled practitioners like any other professional service, instead of a second
or third hand operation with its consequent perfunctory effects.
A NEW TRAINING FOE TEACHEES
The degree of selection and training contemplated promises another sweeping im-
provement of far-reaching importance. In the teacher of to-day the slight prepara-
tion required and the casual way in which the work may be picked up or dropped
result in a person bred to routine and conformity, possessing little original insight
for his work. He forms one of a secluded class, protected as well as repressed by the
rigid machine of which he is a part. To correct this, we need to pick out men and
women of large ability and give them a long and thorough preparation aimed solely
at their future task. By so doing we can entrust our schools to independent and self-
possessed personalities who fairly represent the spirit of their time, who bring the
schools into the vital current of events, and make them closely responsive to the
criticisms and aspirations of the people they serve. Thus only can we secure a sensi-
tive and flexible education that moves intelligently and surely on its path.
INTRODUCTION 11
In demanding for all teachers the standards now required for good secondary in-
struction, the reference is to their amount only. To make a teacher in the sense out-
lined above, which is the only sense in which teachers can be of use under future
conditions, the present form of preparation, elementary and secondary alike, needs
revision. It is a matter primarily of point of view. The average secondary teacher
to-day is a person who has taken a college course for his own sake and as he chose.
At or near the close thereof he has concluded to "go into teaching" — temporarily,
and with no thought of the requirements of a difficult profession. The elementary
teacher in the country districts is untrained; in the cities he, or more frequently she,
has sometimes undergone specific training, but oftener, particularly in the West, his
elementary school service has been a time-marking occupation until he could secure
college points sufficient to "promote" him to a high school, itself a temporary stopping-
place on the road to a profession or, in the case of women, to marriage. In either group
the point of view of the public service is neither enforced by the public nor dreamed
of by the teacher. The public confesses by the measure of its own rewards that the
quality of its teaching service is no supreme or vital matter to it, if only the forms are
there according to the letter of the law. It therefore offers its candidates, in lieu of
professional training, an education that fits their general needs, and invites them in
the intervals of study to come and manage the schools for awhile in order to fill their
purses.
We are fast learning that if democracy is to have genuine education and survive,
this sort of thing must cease. The hollowness of the process has its faithful counter-
part in the hollowness of the teacher's plan and purpose. For a serious educative
undertaking, the way must be paved by a thoroughly well-organized course of train-
ing, directed toward the specific work to be done, and exhausting our professional
resources in that field. The task is difficult and responsible enough even with the
most liberal training we know; to omit this, or to conceive the work as an incidental
diversion for the employment of "general culture," is to miss the point completely.
The first and sole consideration in planning a teacher's preparation is the question :
Does this feature contribute most to the effective discharge of the particular duty in
view, as the welfare of the service requires? Personal considerations are beside the mark.
Circumstances in America have made us largely dependent upon women for the
teachers we have, and the proposals made above might not completely equalize men's
share in instruction even at three or four times the present salaries, tho it would tend
to do so. Whether this ensue or not, the steps suggested would at least remove the
meaningless restriction of the profession to unmarried women. To teach well is the
privilege of maturity and experience; it is the prerogative of men and women of affairs,
of fatherhood, of motherhood; it is the business of brains and a vigorous social par-
ticipation that draws the pupil into the stream of interesting and instructive per-
sons and events. What have immature girls to do with this except as they prepare
to make it the main object of their lives irrespective of marriage?
12 THE PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION OF TEACHERS
The changes urged above have one other interesting and important implication.
The attainment of an integrated school system, manned by teachers of similar and
homogeneous training for the purpose, involves a like simplification and coordina-
tion of our agencies for preparing teachers. To-day normal school and university
reflect and perpetuate the traditional cleavage between elementary and secondary
school. In the best instances there is involved here only the friction of overlapping
territory rather than essentially unsympathetic views of the process by which a
teacher should be prepared. However far apart some normal schools and some uni-
versities may be, the enlightened and progressive elements of each party are moving
along the same intellectual road.
The time has come to clear up the existing confusion. All institutional education
for the teaching profession should be placed clearly upon a collegiate footing and
organized under a single competent direction as a part of the state university, where
one exists, parallel with medical, legal, engineering, and other similar divisions of
higher education. This signifies no " concessions " either to the university or to the
normal schools. " Normal " schools should drop that name, and as professional col-
leges of education should become an acknowledged part of the greater university
whole simply because they are a part of the state's system of higher education, which
is all the term "university" now implies. We would thus secure a unified and cen-
tralized authority prepared to deal in a consistent and efficient manner with the
state's largest problem in higher and professional education.
THE TEACHEK AND THE PUBLIC
The type of teacher here proposed is a radically different individual from his pres-
ent prototype, and demands a vigorous and discriminating introduction to the pub-
lic that he is intended to serve. It is the public that must purchase the services of
such a teacher; it is the public, therefore, that must be convinced of his worth.
Upon the teachers themselves the outward responsibility for such a movement can-
not fairly be placed; from them may reasonably be expected the maximum develop-
ment and refinement of their own procedure — a far more conclusive argument for
more of it, at its best, than any "demands for social justice" to teachers as a class.
To double or to treble the public investment in such service, to extend largely its
resources by broader and richer training, to seek a selection of ability preeminently
suited to its purpose — this is a matter of public policy, and has nothing to do with
the personal needs or demands of any group of people. This is the work primarily
of that portion of the educated public that knows the value of good teachers. Spe-
cifically, it is to school superintendents and school boards, and, above all, to state
commissioners of education, that the public has a right to look for reasoned and con-
vincing insistence that the best teachers are worth while, and it is they who are
responsible for organizing public opinion to demand that the best teachers be em-
ployed. It is of relatively small importance that teachers should be well paid merely
INTRODUCTION 13
because they are teachers, but it is of supreme importance to any society that com-
petent teachers who are capable of fine service should be amply rewarded and care-
fully protected throughout their careers.
To attain this it is proper, not that teachers themselves should agitate, unionize,
and strike, but that school executives, municipal and state, in well-organized cam-
paigns, should rally their thousands of lay supporters and attack city and state gov-
ernments and the uninformed public opinion about them in the interests of better
teaching. Leadership of this sort in the protection and promotion of a community's
most precious asset is the foremost duty of state and city superintendents. It is their
business to make an abundance of good teaching an arresting and winning cause in
chambers of commerce, churches, rotary clubs, labor unions, and similar civic and so-
cial organizations of citizen parents who control taxation. Fine instruction does not
at present prevail in American communities simply because it is not understood; the
average parent's interest in his child's school is almost imperceptible, not because his
interest in his child is not profound, but because the teaching purpose and process
has never taken the parent convincingly into its confidence. That such a confidence
would too often exhaust the uncertain and ill-preparedi teacher has not assisted the
exchange. Parent- teacher associations have rendered an important service by promot-
ing helpful social relations between home and school, but they obviously have not
taught the parent how to discriminate between the teaching now provided and the
better teaching that might be provided, nor is that their purpose. Here is a field al-
most completely un worked. Enthusiasm and personal sacrifice to secure good teach-
ing for his children are latent in well-nigh every parent. He must, however, know defi-
nitely and vividly what good teaching is, and he must understand clearly that its value
is on the whole directly related to its cost. Convince any American public that the
alleged products of a fine teacher are real, and the cost will speedily become a wholly
secondary consideration.
THE PRESENT CBISIS IN PUBLIC EDUCATION
It is scarcely appropriate to present a study of conditions affecting the future
progress of public instruction in the United States without more than passing refer-
ence to the situation of the teacher arising from the universal economic dislocation
now ensuing upon the recent war. Within a few months the value of a teacher's sal-
ary or " wages " has fallen approximately fifty per cent There is nothing ominous
about this fact, inasmuch as the same thing has happened to every other salaried
professional worker in common with the rest of the world, but there are portentous
possibilities in the failure of school authorities to make a prompt repair of the damage
their first obligation.
Readjustment is slow for several reasons, but chiefly because it is assumed to be a
question merely of the personal comfort of a class of public servants instead of an im-
mediate menace to the welfare of the children and indirectly of the communities of
14 THE PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION OF TEACHERS
which they form a part. Popular pressure governs public taxation. Orderly children
comfortably housed exert no pressure. Their teachers may descend the full scale of
excellence with little popular protest and with an agreeable decrease in the budget.
Where this result can be achieved simply by letting salaries stand still, as at pres-
ent, those taxpayers who are intent solely upon their income make full use of the
opportunity before the friends of education find their voices. To-day, therefore, in-
stead of a sensitive public opinion moving swiftly to defend our finest possession, we
have the unhappy spectacle of a rapidly accelerating exodus from the staffs of public
schools throughout the country ; and very many schools cannot open their doors be-
cause of lack of teachers, even the poorest.
The situation is complicated by a further unfortunate but obvious difficulty. The
school superintendent of any given community should be the one intelligent and
determined stimulus or rallying-point, as the case may be, for all forces seeking better
public education. As a matter of fact, however, conditions of tenure in this country
have been such that in probably the majority of communities the school superintend-
ent feels more keenly and responds more readily to the pressure of the " business in-
terests " than to the less vociferous appeals for better schools. Superintendents who
stake their careers on the one really important objective in their entire program
better salaries for better teachers — court removal, or loss of influence. Hence the real
initiative in such a proposal is more often awaited from other sources, or is left to the
school board as it may be moved to emulate other cities. The numerous and splendid
examples of the contrary courageous policy, by skilfully attracting popular support,
have steadily improved standards of salary, and have given American schools what
excellence they possess. In such a crisis as the present, these men gather up all the
weight of a public sentiment that they have assiduously organized and cultivated,
and save their hard won gains by bringing their teachers' salaries promptly to the
new level.
It may safely be said that it is not the intention of the American people to sacri-
fice the American school, both present and future, to the whim of a sudden economic
upheaval — an upheaval, the net result of which, far from touching the country's
resources, has produced such material expansion and enrichment, both absolute
and relative to other countries, as few nations in history have ever yet experienced.
Wealth for public education is potentially available as never before. Personnel, too,
is abundant. To-day, as always, the supply of "bom teachers " is far beyond the de-
mand. The sole need is to make it worth while for gifted teachers to secure thorough
training and to spend their lives in providing that which every intelligent adult most
desires, both for himself and for his children, and that which alone in the end exalts
a nation.
All of the elements in the situation favor not only a speedy recovery of the old
equilibrium, but a notable shift of wealth and emphasis in favor of far better public
schools, that is, of far better teaching, than has ever been known before. Our illumi-
INTRODUCTION 15
nating experiences with education, both positive and negative, in our own army ; the
significant disclosures of the war in the behavior of foreign nations, both allied and
opposed, as a result of their educational practices; the greatly refined definition of
the democratic human purpose and ideal as the assured outcome of the long struggle;
and finally, the general shock of pervasive change and rapid readjustment that has
delivered us from old conventions and favors fresh attitudes; — all of these novel and
impressive considerations urge us manifestly in one direction. There probably never
was a time in our history when popular education could be brought so easily into a
permanently larger financial perspective, when an abundance of good teaching could
be made available with such unanimity from all sides, as just now.
Those who desire this outcome of the present opportunity must move to its accom-
plishment, and the foremost requirement for the purpose is simply the indispensable
steering-gear of all successful democratic progress — the effectual organization and
thrust of a resolute public opinion. Whether set in motion by a skilful superintend-
ent as his main line of defence, or operating in spite of deputed agents, there should
be for every school system an independent and unofficial organ of approval or criti-
cism wherewith to focus progressive opinion, to invigorate official ideals, or to turn
the scale of wavering decisions in favor of the better cause*
Just now, especially, there is needed in every community that has not already
doubled its appropriations for teachers' salaries in the present emergency, a vigorous
Citizens' Committee for Public Safety in Education. Let such a body first conduct a
more or less, formal referendum on the present issue, clearly stated: "Shall the per-
sons with whom our children are obliged to spend five to six hours daily in school,
obeying their directions and absorbing their ideas, be a dull and sordid group of
spiritless wage workers, or shall they be select and skilful men and women possessed
of such intellectual and social power and status as we desire our children — all chil-
dren— to assume?" Then let this body do its utmost to give the verdict immediate
effect by demanding greatly increased rewards, better conditions of work, and, above
all, longer training and more critical selection.
When the actual desires of the individual parents, and of all other generous and
far-sighted minds everywhere, become clearly articulate on this point there will be
no "crisis in education;" there will be only the overwhelming recognition that the
teacher must represent, not another worker merely, like the rest of us, but a spirit-
ual institution; that, before all others, this person, set as a copy and guide to youth
for months and years together, must be the visible embodiment of the ideal that
the present generation holds for its successors. It will then be agreed that those fine
personalities that can render this service must be cherished and protected, enabled
to live life as life is meant to be lived, and encouraged to transmit its best product to
our children who create the future.
II
THE STATE OF MISSOURI
SURFACE FEATURES
MISSOURI is one of the larger states and among the wealthiest in the American Union.
It lies along the west bank of the Mississippi River, extending in rhomboidal shape
thru some four degrees of latitude northwest from parallel 26° 30", which is likewise
the southern boundary of Kentucky and Virginia. The Missouri River ( " The Great
Muddy "), from which the state derives its name, forms the northern part of its west-
ern boundary as far as Kansas City. Turning eastward at that point, the river crosses
the centre of the state to a point near St. Louis on the Mississippi, thus furnishing
a natural highway between these two important centres in which the large affairs of
the entire region are mainly transacted. In length of navigable waterways within or
on Its borders Missouri stands fifth among the states.
The total area is about seventy thousand square miles, or nearly two-thirds that
of the kingdom of Italy. The northern, northwestern, and western portions contain
some of the most productive farm land in the country, while the south central sec-
tion is occupied by the low dome of the northern Ozarks, in general elevations of
from eleven to sixteen hundred feet above the sea. These give place in the extreme
southeast to a small area of Mississippi lowlands, where conditions are typically
southern.
CHARACTERISTICS OF POPULATION
The population within these limits represents the coalescence of several elements.
While the territory was still in French and Spanish hands, many Americans, chiefly
from the southern states, found their way past the French colonies and trading-posts
that lined the Mississippi, and took up homesteads in the interior. When the Louisi-
ana Territory was purchased by the United States in 180S, about three-fifths of the
inhabitants, largely confined to what is now Missouri, were Americans, including
what negroes they brought with them, and after that date the immigration from Ken-
tucky, Tennessee, and Virginia continued yet more rapidly. From 1815 on, arrivals
from north of the Ohio were numerous, tho not until sometime after the Civil Wax-
did they tend to dominate the state.1
Not far from one-fourth (2£.7 per cent) of the entire population is of foreign ex-
traction, and of this element about one-half is German; Irish, English, and Russians
are the next in frequency, tho in small proportions. The German element is an old
1 The reports of the county superintendents shortly after the Civil War throw some lighten immigration from other
f?1??,^.1 fc ^fected education. Thus in 1868 Clinton County reports : "The Eastern teachers are generally well qual-
ified. The Greene County superintendent says : "A large majority of our teachers were educated in the East and
came here expressly to teach." And the superintendent in Henry County ^ives the following interesting: informa-
tion : We have a very fair corps of teachers," From "Ohio, seventeen ; Indiana, eleven ; Missouri, ten ; Illinois, five ;
Iowa two; Virginia, two; Kentucky, one; New Hampshire, one; New York, one; Vermont, one; Pennsylvania,
SSiJSf TmV°n\; Te?n*f ee< °ne; and Canada, one." These teachers received from $85 to $40 per month -not
Sim \\ « HT +* each*r? >n thjsamf district to-day. (See Report of the Superintendent of Public Schools, 1808. This
annual publication will be referred to hereafter as the State Report*}
THE STATE OF MISSOURI
17
one, appearing first about 1845, and passing its maximum inflow long before the
century closed. The attitude of the state toward slavery as well as its progress in
education seems to have been favorably afiected by these newcomers. Most immi-
grants from abroad prefer urban to rural conditions. In 1910 persons of foreign birth
or parentage constituted thirty-eight per cent of the white urban population in
Missouri, and only twelve per cent in the rural districts. The total proportion of
foreign birth in 1910 showed no increase since 1900. The countries from which the
increases relative to 1900 were largest are Greece, Turkey, Roumania, Hungary, and
Mexico; Russia and Italy more than doubled the number of their representatives
and Austria nearly so.
In total population Missouri, with about three and one-quarter millions, ranks
seventh among the states, altho its land area gives it only the eighteenth place.
Nearly five per cent are negroes — a slowly dwindling element largely confined to
towns ; slightly over one per cent of the Missouri farmers are negroes. About three-
fifths of the total population live in the country or in places with fewer than twenty-
five hundred inhabitants. This class diminished somewhat (3.5 per cent) between 19001
and 1910, while the urban population increased more than one-fifth during the same
period. Seventy-one out of the one hundred fourteen counties showed a loss in 1910
as compared with twenty that had decreased in 1900, while the absolute gain in St.
Louis City, St. Louis County, and Jackson County, where Kansas City is located,
far outweighed the gain — six per cent — in the state as a whole. In density of pop-
ulation Missouri leads all states west of the Mississippi, and is similar to .New Hamp-
shire, Michigan, and Virginia in the East.
OCCUPATIONS
The distribution of occupations in Missouri follows closely that of the United States
as a whole. While not quite so typical as Indiana or Wisconsin, the state exhibits a
disposition of occupations that is wholly representative of the country at large. The
distribution in 1910 of persons ten years of age and over who were engaged in gainful
occupations in the United States and in Missouri was as follows :
Agriculture,
Forestry, and
Animal Hus-
bandry
Extraction
of
Minerals
Manufacturing
and Mechanical
Industries
Trans-
porta-
tion
Trade
Public
Service
Profes-
sional
Service
Domestic
and Per-
sonal Ser-
vice
Clerical
Occupa-
tions
U.S.
33.2% •
2.5%
27.9%
6.9%
9.5%
1.2%
4.4%
9.9%
4.6%
Missouri
35.5
2.1
23.6
7.1
11.1
1.1
4.7
9.8
5.0
As appears above, the emphasis falls on the agricultural rather than on the manu-
facturing phase of industry, altho both are important. Missouri rants fifth among
the states in the total value of its farm property, which showed in 1910 a relative
1 Missouri was one of six states with diminished rural population in 1910, New Hampshire, Vermont, Ohio, Indiana,
and Iowa being t|ie others.
18 THE PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION OF TEACHERS
increase greater than In any decade since I860; it ranks tenth in the value per acre
of its farm land, and sixth in the total value of its crops, of which cereals, chiefly corn,,
constitute two-thirds. As the number of farmers decreases, the size of farms increases
slightly; the proportion of tenant farmers has remained nearly the same during the
past thirty years — thirty per cent,
In manufactures Missouri is the ninth state in number of establishments, tenth in
total value of manufactured products, and eleventh in number of wage- earners. Three-
quarters of the manufacturing is done in ten cities of ten thousand or more inhab-
itants, two-thirds of it in St. Louis and Kansas City alone — the only cities in the state
having over one hundred thousand inhabitants. The particular industries are well dis-
tributed. The following furnish the greatest proportions of the total value of man-
ufactured products: slaughtering and meat-packing (13.9 per cent), boots and shoes
(8.5 per cent), flour-mill and grist-mill products (7.8 per cent), and printing and pub-
lishing (5.S per cent). In value of mining products Missouri ranks eleventh. Over two-
thirds of this comes from lead and zinc mines, which furnish about seventy per cent
of the entire American output of these metals.
POLITICAL HISTORY
Politically the state fills a unique place in the story of the nation's development.
On its admission as a slave-holding state in 1821 was conditioned the freedom of
all other territory north of its southern boundary, included in the Louisiana Purchase
of 1803. As a border state of the early southern group it was peculiarly accessible to
northern influences, and soon developed a strong anti-slavery minority. This party
held the state for the Union during the Civil War, and induced it voluntarily to
abandon slavery and to sacrifice nearly as many lives in the Union cause as did
Massachusetts. After ten years of radical Republican government during and after the
Civil War, the state gradually returned to its normal democratic affiliation, which it
retained until 1909. Since then its parties have been more evenly balanced. The first
constitution of 18£0 was overthrown by the upheaval during the war, and was fol-
lowed in 1865 by an instrument containing a remarkable mixture of intolerance and
reform, to which in protest succeeded the constitution of 1875, a conservative, and
in some respects repressive, fundamental law under which, with occasional amend-
ment, the state has operated ever since. A revision is greatly needed and apparently
very generally desired.
EDUCATIONAL DEVELOPMENT
In education Missouri has furnished an instructive chapter, particularly in its
experience with the idea of public schooling at public expense. The characteristic
feature of its history in this respect has been the struggle between a well-informed
and devoted educational leadership and an exceedingly conservative legislative opin-
ion. The attitude of the public mind was first determined by the traditions of the
THE STATE OF MISSOURI 19
original settlers from southern states, where education was a family matter to be ac-
complished thru private neighborhood cooperation, or by means of tutor and gov-
erness. The idea of free public education was associated habitually with charitable
provision for poor and orphaned children.1 This point of view was further sanctioned
by a religious motive,, which operated with more or less vigor to retain all education
under sectarian influences. The impulse to education was as active in early Missouri
history as anywhere else in the nation. Denominational colleges were established liter-
ally by the score. The Baptists alone, the most numerous among Protestant denomi-
nations, founded sixteen colleges, of which four still survive. But enthusiasm for
free schools, controlled and supported by state and local authority and independ-
ent of religious affiliation, was a slow growth.
Previous to 18S4, therefore, educational legislation was confined to the charter-
ing of private academies. The legislation of 1834, 1835, and 1839, altho foreshadow-
ing a system of free public schools, was either wholly inoperative or but partly effec-
tive. Taxation for school purposes was in general hotly opposed by the rich, and
by those who had no children. "Subscription" schools, where for perhaps a dollar a
month per child a teacher would give instruction as long as he could hold attendance,
abounded in all parts of the state. An act of 1853 permanently established a state
superintendency, except for the period of the Civil War, and marked progress in
financial support, but in 1861, altho all counties were organized, about one-fourth
of the school expenses was still supplied from tuition fees. It was then estimated that
one hundred thousand children in the state at large did not attend school, and that
nearly one-fifth of the organized school districts had no schoolhouses.2
The close of the Civil War found radical elements for the first time in control.
These immediately set out to popularize the free public school, and succeeded to the
extent at least of securing "qualified toleration," as Superintendent Monteith put
it. Normal schools won a foothold; centralized county supervision was inaugurated,
and for a time the outlook for public education was bright, only to be clouded again
by the reaction of 1874 and 1875, when the earlier balance of opinion was restored.
County superintendents were then abolished contrary to the judgment, it would
appear, of nearly every important educational authority in the state, and in spite of
continued agitation they were not restored until 1909. The normal schools fought for
their lives in the legislature for ten years or more, and when finally accepted, were but
meagrely supported. The constitution of 1875 laid down financial restrictions that
have ever since made the state appear to be throttling its own educational interests.
Thru all this tlie educational leaders of the commonwealth have held a true course;
the state has at least been well advised. The whole series of state superintendents,
1 The charter of Ste, Genevieve Academy, 1808, provides that the children of the poor and of Indians shall be taught
gratis. The constitution of 1820, Art. VI, Sec. 1, reads: " One school or more shall be established in each township as
soon as practicable and necessary where the poor shall be taught gratis." The school law of 1839 provides schools
at which children of "indigent persons "are 'to he admitted without payment toward the teacher's wages and
without supplying their allotted share of the fuel. (Art. IV. Sec. SI, 42.)
a State Report, 1861, pa&es 107, 108 (Senate-Journal, 21st G. A. Sess. 1, App.).
20 THE PROFESSIONAL PKEPAEATION OE TEACHERS
with scarcely an exception, altho of necessity party men, and not always broadly
educated, labored heroically, regardless of party, for a sound and effective program.
While recording chiefly their helpless struggles with confused and inadequate legis-
lation, their annual reports have urged unremittingly the best and most obvious
practical improvements. To these efforts were added the generally harmonious support
and propaganda of the university and normal schools, the private colleges, and other
institutional agencies. From about the turn of the new century, and with the dis-
appearance of the preceding generation of lawmakers, this tedious campaign of educa-
tion began to bear fruit, and the period since then has witnessed some excellent con-
structive legislation — the beginnings of a system worthy of the needs and resources
of a great state.
As a problem for education, and particularly as a problem in the preparation of
teachers for a public school system, the State of Missouri may fairly be regarded as
typical of the country as a whole. Characteristics of surface and population are mark-
edly representative. In their organization of public education the northern and west-
ern states are in general superior, while the southern states fall somewhat, often
considerably, behind. If certain significant criteria given usually in the reports of
the United States Commissioner of Education be reviewed, the rather low average
position of the state becomes apparent. These rankings of 1915-16 give the following
result :
Amount Rank
among
States
Average expenditure per capita of population five to eighteen years of age $19.97 32d
Average number of days attendance for each child five to eighteen years of age 96.1 25th
Average number of days attendance by each pupil enrolled 118.5 30th
Average number of days schools were kept 161,8 29th
Number attending daily for each 100 enrolled 73.2 27th
Proportion of school population enrolled 81.08% 18th
Proportion of secondary school attendance1 15.4% 28th
Average monthly salary of all teachers $69.19 21st
Income of permanent school funds $872,289.00 7th
Illiterates among native whites of native parentage 3,4/%? 35th
In six of the ten items given above, Missouri ranks below the median, and in a
seventh the state is itself the median among the forty-nine independent units that
constitute the nation. The relation of school expenditure to the per capita wealth
of the state would appear to be of equal importance with the points already noted.
But the fact that Missouri ranks twenty-ninth in per capita wealth and twenty-sev-
enth in proportion of school expenditure thereon loses much of its apparent mean-
ing as an educational measure, when it is considered that Massachusetts ranks twenty-
1 Not given in the Commissioner's Report. The figure used here is the proportion of secondary students in public
and private schools, 1915-16, with reference to the population from 15 to 19 years of ag-e, inclusive. The latter fac-
tor was secured by taking, of the total population, as estimated by the Census Bureau for 1916, such a proportion
as the age group in question constituted of the- total population in 1910. For Missouri this was 10.1 per cent. The
absolute proportion thus arrived at is, of course, open to criticism; for purposes of comparison., however, the mea-
sure is significant: it ranges from 35.1 per cent in California to 6.5 per cent in South Carolina.
THE STATE OF MISSOURI 21
seventh in per capita wealth and third in the proportion expended for schools, while
Idaho ranks thirty-first in wealth and leads the states in the proportion given to
schools.1
However closely this condition in Missouri may approximate the average or median,
the reason for it is hardly typical of those other communities in which a similar or
worse state of public education exists; in Missouri it is simply an acquiescent atti-
tude of mind that is responsible, whereas elsewhere the situation is usually compli-
cated by difficult racial considerations. A thriving university of national importance,
six prosperous normal schools, a half a score of private colleges of good repute — all
bear testimony to a vigorous intellectual life; while the metropolis of the state pos-
sesses a school system that competent critics consider among the first two or three in
America. Such a state may have whatever it most desires.
1 These figures are taken from the Commissioner's Report for 1917, and are for 1912.
Ill
ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF NORMAL SCHOOLS
A. THE ORIGIN OF NORMAL SCHOOLS IN THE UNITED STATES
EARLIEST ADVOCACY OF TEACHER-TRAINING
THE recognition that a teacher should have qualifications for his profession some-
what more specialized than the vague requirement that he be a "fit person '' appears
to have dawned faintly toward the close of the eighteenth century. In 1789 there
appeared in the Massachusetts Magazine an "Essay upon the Importance of Study-
ing the English Language Grammatically," in which the author advocates the estab-
lishment of a public grammar school in each county in place of the existing Latin
grammar schools. "At the head of this county school I would place an able precep-
tor, who should superintend the whole instruction of youth entrusted to his care,
and who, together with a board of overseers, should annually examine young gentle-
men designed for schoolmasters in reading, writing, arithmetic, and English gram-
mar, and if they are found qualified for the office of schoolkeeping and able to teach
these branches with ease and propriety, to recommend them for this purpose. No
man ought to be suffered to superintend ever so small a school except he has been
first examined by a body of men of this character and authorized for this purpose."
It may be objected that this statement is not a definite advocacy of training for the
teaching profession ; it will be admitted, however, that the insistence on proper selec-
tion and some form of certification are at least essential steps in the direction of
more adequate professional preparation.
Professor Denison Olmstead, of Yale College, was more specific in his commence-
ment address in 181S on "The State of Education in Connecticut." Here is presented
a definite recommendation of a seminary for schoolmasters in which 6Cthe pupils were
to study and recite whatever they themselves were afterwards to teach, partly for
the purpose of acquiring a more perfect knowledge of these subjects, and partly of
learning from the methods adopted by the principal the best modes of teaching."" The
course was to include lectures on the organization and government of schools. Eleven
years later another Yale professor, James L. Kingsley, advocated in the NortJi Amer-
ican Review the establishment of an institution "intermediate between the com-
mon schools and the university.'1 "Such a measure would give new vigor to the whole
system of education. The board of visitors, which now decides on the qualifications
of instructors, must be, in most instances, a very imperfect check on the intrusion of
ignorance. The teachers, it is understood, have now very seldom any other prepara-
tion than they receive in the very school where they afterwards instruct, or in the
school of some neighboring district, where the advantages for improvement are no
better." In a pamphlet, Sitgrgestions on Ed^^Jcation^ also written in 18£3, William
Russell, a teacher in the New Township Academy in New Haven, who in 18S6 be-
came the editor of one of the earliest American professional magazines, the Journal
NORMAL SCHOOLS IN THE UNITED STATES . 28
of Education, supported Professor Kingsley's recommendation and attributed the in-
adequacy of the common schools to the lack of trained teachers. This defect could be
removed by the establishment of seminaries for the training and licensing of teachers.
EARLY EXPERIMENTS
The suggestions of Kingsley and Russell had been anticipated by a few months by
the Rev. Samuel R. Hall, who, after a successful teaching experience of eight years,
opened a seminary for the training of teachers at Concord, Vermont, in March, 18£3.
In 1829 Hall published the first American textbook on education, Lectures on School-
Keeping^ which had a great vogue in many parts of the country, and in New York
State and Kentucky was officially distributed among the teachers. When the Teach-
ers' Seminary was organized in 1830 as a department of the Phillips Academy at An-
dover, " to afford the means of a thorough scientific and practical education prepar-
atory to the profession of teaching," Hall became the first principal and remained
until 1837, when he took charge of another school at Plymouth, New Hampshire.
Lecturing in 1833 on the "Necessity of Educating Teachers," Hall stated that "there
is not in our whole country, one seminary where the educator of children can be thor-
oughly qualified for his important work." He then referred to the thirty seminaries
in Prussia and to a few schools in Massachusetts which "devote particular attention
to the qualifications of teachers, but yet in connection with a general school for the
common purposes of education."" He clearly had in mind the establishment of sep-
arate professional institutions, when he urged, "Educate men for the business of
teaching, employ and pay them when educated."
Neither the establishment of the seminary at Concord in 1823 nor its subsequent
success appears to have attracted much attention. Efforts to secure the establishment
of institutions for the preparation of teachers became more frequent and more insist-
ent about 1825, and appai'ently the movement was spontaneous and for a time, at any
rate, was but slightly influenced by foreign example and practice. In 1825 Walter R.
Johnson, of German town, Pennsylvania, wrote Observations on the Improvement of
Seminaries of Learning in the United States ', with Suggestions for its Accomplishment.
Foremost among his suggestions was that for the establishment of seminaries for
teachers similar to those existing in Prussia. " A perfect plan for the education of
teachers and professors would require that the institution with which the school for
teachers is proposed to be connected should embrace a complete circle of the sciences
and arts, and that a professor should be appointed to lecture on the mode of teach-
ing in each separate department." The professional preparation should include the
study of the theory and principles of education, school practice and government,
and the science of mental development. In the same year Philip Lindsey, the acting
president of the College of New Jersey, in an address at Princeton urged that "Our
country needs Seminaries purposely to train up and qualify young men for the pro-
fession of teaching. We have our theological seminaries, our medical and law schools.
m ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF NORMAL SCHOOLS
which receive the graduates of our colleges and fit them for their respective profes-
sions and whenever the profession of teaching shall be duly honored and appreciated,
it is not doubted but that it will receive similar attention and be favored with equal
advantages." Later in the same year, in his inaugural address as President of the
University of Nashville, Lindsey emphasized the same point. John Maclean, another
Princeton professor, subsequently president, recommended in 18S8" the establishment
(by the state) of an institution to educate young men for the business of teaching."
DEVELOPMENT OF PUBLIC OPINION
These isolated instances indicate the tendencies of the day, but the popularization
of the idea of preparing teachers was not due to these writers. The earliest contribu-
tion to the subject which attracted general attention was Thomas H. Gallaudet's
Plan of a Seminary for the Education and Instruction of Youtli^ which appeared in
the Connecticut Observer in 18&5. "Why not have an institution," asks Gallaudet,
" for the training up of instructors for their sphere of labor, as well as institutions
to prepare young men for the duties of the divine, the lawyer or the physician? . . .
Such an institution would also tend to elevate the tone of public sentiment and to
quicken the zeal of public effort with regard to the correct intellectual and moral
education of the rising generation." The curriculum of this institution should include
the common branches of English education and the theory and practice of education.
A library and practice school should be connected with the seminary. Connecticut's
debt to Gallaudet was later recognized when the students of the first normal school
established in the state, at New Britain in 1850, formed a Gallaudet Society,
In 18S4-&5 James G. Carter, the "father of normal schools," entered upon the task
of urging the establishment of normal schools1 in Massachusetts, and did not lay it
down until the first state normal school in this country was opened at Lexington in
1839. His Essays on Popular Education, which appeared in the Boston Patriot ^ at-
tracted considerable attention not only in this country but also abroad. He argued
that it was uneconomical to expend money on education until satisfactory and well-
qualified teachers could be secured. The mere possession of knowledge was no guar-
antee of ability to communicate it. "When instructors understand their profession,
that is, in a word, when they understand the philosophy of the infant mind, what
powers are earliest developed and what studies are best adapted to their development,
then it will be time to lay out and subdivide their work into an energetic system
of public instruction.55 The institution for the training of teachers should be main-
tained by the state as part of the free school system, and should include a library and
a school for children of different ages. It is significant that Carter does not yet refer
to foreign examples, but puts his scheme forward as something new and visionary. In
18S7 he petitioned the Massachusetts legislature to appropriate money for the estab-
lishment of a state institution for the training of teachers. On the refusal of the legisla-
ture he opened a private seminary at Lancaster in 1827, but met with little success.
NORMAL SCHOOLS IN THE UNITED STATES 525
EXAMPLE OF GERMANY
New influences, however, began to make themselves felt about 1830. The theorists
discovered that everything that had been urged in favor of the preparation of teach-
ers had already been put into successful practice in Prussia and elsewhere. Henry E.
Dwight in his Travels in the North of Germany in 1825~1S%6, which appeared in 1829.,
devotes one of his letters to an account of seminaries for the Education of School-
masters. He points out that "to understand a subject will not of itself enable one
to impart a clear view of the best mode of communicating knowledge to the minds
of children. This capacity can only be acquired by previous preparation or by long
experience." He had great hopes of the results of such seminaries. "Were such school-
masters provided for the education of youth in Connecticut, the intellectual charac-
ter of the mass of inhabitants would, in one generation, not only become superior
to that of every other people, but it would become the wonder and admiration of
our country."
EFFORTS OF EDUCATIONAL LEADERS
After 1830 the work of propaganda was definitely taken up in professional circles,
and the efforts continued unremittingly until they were crowned with success about
ten years later. In 1831 William C. Woodbridge began to urge the importance of
training teachers in his Annals of Education, and in June of that year gave an account
of the Prussian system. To the Rev. Charles Brooks is due the chief credit for the
popularization and the ultimate acceptance in Massachusetts of the idea of teacher-
training. His attention was directed to the subject during a visit to Europe in 1834*
and by prolonged discussion on his return voyage with Dr. EL Julius, who was sent
to this country by the Prussian government to investigate prison conditions. In a
Thanksgiving address delivered at Hingham in 1835 he advocated the establishment
of teachers' seminaries and proposed a series of conventions to be held in Plymouth
County to promote the idea. The first convention was held in December, 1836, and
was followed by five others. Untiring in his efforts, Brooks addressed meetings in
various important centres in Massachusetts in 1836 and 1837, and extended his en-
deavors to New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, and
Pennsylvania. Everywhere he took as his theme the statement, "As is the Teacher
so is the School," and drew his illustrations and examples from Prussia and Holland.
The influence of Dr. Julius has already been mentioned; an outline of the Prussian
system by him was printed in 1835 with legislative documents in Massachusetts and
New York. To this was added the inspiration that Brooks derived from M. Cousin's
Report on Public Instruction in Germany. The translation of this work by Sarah Aus-
tin, with an introduction by J. Orville Taylor, was published in New York in 1835,
and in the same year a paper, printed in 1836 and based on Cousin's Report, was read
before the American Institute of Instruction. Further information on the Prussian
educational system was furnished in the widely distributed reports of Calvin E. Stowe
£6 ^ ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF NORMAL SCHOOLS
(Elementary Education in Europe, 1837) and of Alexander D. Bache (Report on Edu-
cation in Europe ', 1839).
THE TERM "NORMAL SCHOOL"
It was at this period that the term "normal school" began to replace "teachers'
seminaries." There can be no doubt that this was due directly to Cousin's Report on
Germany and the subsequent Report on Public Instruction in Holland. Cousin merely
applied the current French term to the corresponding institutions in the countries
visited by him. The French system of training teachers had hardly begun to have a
national status when Cousin made- his report. The Convention had, on October 30,
1794, decreed the creation in Paris of an Nicole Normale in which citizens of the Re-
public over the age of twenty-one and already instructed in the useful sciences should
be taught how to teach and then go back to their own districts and in turn train other
teachers. It was intended that the course should last four months, but the experiment,
with which were associated such men as Legrange, Laplace, Monge, Hauy, and Ber-
nardin de St. Pierre, failed. It is interesting to note that the Committee of Public
Instruction adopted this idea from the plan successfully employed by the Commit-
tee of Public Safety to train citizens drawn to Paris from all parts of the country,
in the processes for manufacturing gunpowder and cannon. In a note to his Lecture
on Normal Schools and Teachers* Seminaries Stowe wrote, "The French adjective nor-
mal is derived from the Latin noun norma, which signifies a carpenter's square^ a ride,
a pattern, a model; and the very general use of this term to designate institutions for
the preparation of teachers, leads us at once to the idea of a model school for practice,
an essential constituent part of a Teachers* Seminary" The term ecole normale does
not appear to have been employed earlier than 1794. The successful establishment
of a state system for the preparation of teachers in 1832 was due to the success of the
normal primary school founded in Strasbourg in 1810 and planned on the German
model.
Beyond contributing the title, the French system does not appear to have exercised
any influence on the development of normal schools. There can be no doubt that the
promotion of the idea of training teachers was directly influenced by the Prussian
example. Brooks himself had no hesitation in recognizing this influence. In a lec-
ture on the History of the Missionary Agency, in Massachusetts, of the State Normal
Schools in Prussia, delivered in 1864 at the Quarter-Centennial Normal School cele-
bration of Framingham, he stated, "I must say, that to the Prussian system of state
normal schools belongs the distinctive glory of this day." He was conscious, however,
of the political limitations of the Prussian system; "though I preferred the Holland
system of governmental supervision, I concluded to take the Prussian system of state
normal schools as my model and guide." The adoption of the Prussian model was
evidently not undertaken blindly; the essential social and political differences between
the two countries were clearly recognized and debated. "There were a few papers that
NORMAL SCHOOLS IN THE UNITED STATES £7
laughed at me," said Brooks, "as a dreamer wishing to fill a republican state with
monarchical institutions."
TEACH KII-TBAINING- IN GERMANY
Experiments in the training of teachers had been under way in Germany for more
than a century before the attention of American students was directed to them.
Duke Ernest of Gotha had contemplated the establishment of special courses for pre-
paring teachers in 1654, but an exhausted treasury led to a postponement of the
scheme until 1698. In 1696 Francke had instituted at Halle a Seminariwn praecep-
torum to furnish teachers both for his orphanage and higher schools. His example
inspired several of his disciples, especially Johann Julius Hecker, who opened an in-
stitution for the preparation of teachers in Berlin in 1748; here provision was. made
for the study of a large number of academic subjects., pedagogy, and method, and for
practice teaching. A royal grant was made to Hecker's schools in 1753, and an order
was issued by Frederick the Great that all vacancies in. schools on royal domains
and later throughout Prussia should be filled with teachers trained under Hecker.
Unfortunately Frederick's practice of filling school positions with veterans from his
armies defeated his own purposes, and the beginning of the nineteenth century saw
the Prussian elementary schools in decline.
From this condition the schools were saved by the rapid and extensive establish-
ment of normal schools under the direct influence of educators who had visited Pes-
talozzi. In 1803 J. E. Plarnann, who had been a student at Burgdorf, established
a normal school in Berlin which received royal recognition two years later. At this
time the government sent a few students to Yverdun; on their return these men
established institutions for the training of teachers or became inspectors of schools.
Since the government did little to codify the school regulations or to organize the
curriculum of the schools, the great progress in elementary education that was noticed
by American observers was due almost wholly to the rapid increase in the number of
trained teachers consequent on the multiplication of normal schools. In 1806 there had
been eleven such institutions, to which fourwere added in 1811 and 181S; in 18£5 there
were twenty-eight and in 1840 thirty-eight. They offered a three-year course, and
under the influence of Harnisch at Weissenfels and Diesterweg at Mors had become
powerful instruments in raising both the intellectual and professional status of teach-
ers. Ludwig Beckedorff was especially influential in promoting the welfare of the nor-
mal schools. From 18£1 to 1827 he was councillor in the Ministry for Public Wor-
ship, Education, and Public Health, with special charge of normal schools and ele-
mentary education. He gave particular attention to the former in the belief that the
standards of elementary education could be more effectually raised thru the improve-
ment of teachers than by relying on the amateur efforts of the provincial and local ad-
ministrative machinery. In 1836 the professional status of elementary school teachers
was clearly defined by the issue of regulations for the examinations of candidates at
28 ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF NORMAL SCHOOLS
the close of their normal school training and again after not more than three years
of probationary service. The existence of such conditions was bound to strike the
foreign observer ; and it was the report of these conditions that profoundly affected
the movement for the preparation of teachers in the United States.
LEGISLATIVE ACTIVITY IN MASSACHUSETTS
The establishment of state normal schools became a practical issue soon after
Carter's election to the legislature in 1885. He had the full support of the Ameri-
can Institute of Instruction, which he had helped to found in 1830 and before which
he had lectured in 1881 on "the necessary and most practicable means of raising the
qualifications of teachers." In 1836, as a member of the Committee of Education, he
advocated the establishment of a seminary for the professional education of teachers,
and in the following year he drafted the bill establishing the first Board of Educa-
tion in Massachusetts. On its creation he became one of its first members. In January,
1837, the Institute presented a memorial to the legislature praying "that provision
may be made for the better preparation of the teachers of the schools of the Common-
wealth." This followed an earlier resolution at a meeting held in Boston at which it was
" Resolved, That the business of teaching should be performed by those who have
studied the subject as a profession. Therefore, Resolved, That there ought to be at
least one seminary in each state, devoted entirely to the education of teachers;
and that this seminary should be authorized to confer appropriate degrees."
In the same year Brooks lectured on the subject of teacher-training before the
House of Representatives. In the following year the Board of Education, stimulated
by the promise of a gift of $10,000 conditional on the appropriation of an equal sum
by the legislature for the purpose of improving the qualifications of teachers, passed
resolutions " accepting the proposition and authorizing the Governor, with the advice
and consent of the Council, to draw his warrant upon the treasurer for the sum of
ten thousand dollars, to be placed at the disposal of the Board for the purpose
specified in the original communication." In these resolutions, as well as in securing
the gift from his friend Edmund Dwight, Horace Mann played an important part.
He had in the same year delivered before the Plymouth County Association for the
Improvement of Common Schools a lecture on Special Preparation, a Prerequisite to
Teaching, and, as he indicated in the following year, he had definite views on the
superiority of a specifically professional institution over the academy plan of New
York. The cumulative efforts of the educational stalwarts of the period, Carter,
Brooks, Woodbridge, and Mann, culminated in the opening of the first public normal
school in the country at Lexington on July 3, 1839, followed two months later by
the opening of a second normal school at Barre on September 4, 1839, and of the
third at Bridgewater a year later, on September 9, 1840. In 1845 it was resolved by
the Board of Education "that the schools heretofore known as Normal Schools shall
be hereafter designated as State Normal Schools."
NORMAL SCHOOLS IN THE UNITED STATES 29
The length of the course In these normal schools was one year. Boys were admitted
at the age of seventeen and girls at sixteen after declaring their Intention to qualify
themselves to become school teachers, and after passing an examination in orthogra-
phy, reading, writing, English grammar, geography, and arithmetic. The course of
study included "orthography, reading, grammar, composition, rhetoric and logic;
"writing and drawing; arithmetic, mental and written, algebra, geometry, bookkeep-
ing, navigation, surveying ; geography, ancient and modern, with chronology, statis-
tics, and general history; human physiology, and hygiene or the laws of health; men-
tal philosophy; music 5 constitution and history of Massachusetts and of the United
States; natural philosophy; the principles of piety and morality common to all sects
of Christians ; the science and art of teaching with reference to all the above named
subjects." Attached to each normal school was an experimental or model school in
which the students practised under the supervision of the principal and the obser-
vation and criticisms of their fellow students; "here the knowledge which they ac-
quire in the science of teaching is practically applied. The art is made to grow out
of the science, instead of being empirical." Thus were laid down the main lines of
the American normal school.
NORMAL SCHOOL DEVELOPMENT IN CONNECTICUT
In Connecticut the movement for the training of teachers became active in 1838
after the passage in that year of the act to provide for the better supervision of
common schools. Henry Barnard, as chairman of the committee that reported this
act, urged the importance of the problem of teacher preparation in the House of
Representatives, and in 1839 the Connecticut Common School Journal published a
number of articles discussing this subject and giving a history of normal schools in
Prussia, Holland, and France. This was followed in the next four years by the re-
publication of the works of Gallaudet, Stowe, and Bache. In the First Annual Report
of the Secretary of the Board of Commissioners of Common Schools., Henry Barnard
urged the establishment "of at least one seminary for teachers." Barnard was even
ready to accept a compromise temporarily by the setting up of teachers' depart-
ments in academies, altho he was himself convinced that the normal school was the
institution ultimately desirable. In 1839 he inaugurated a voluntary course for teach-
ers at Hartford, in which a number of specialists lectured on academic subjects and
methods of teaching, and Barnard on the relations of the teacher to the school sys-
tem, parents, and pupils, on school hygiene, teachers' associations, and methods of
interesting parents. Barnard continued his campaign, and in his Third Annual Report
declared that "the most effectual way of improving the qualifications of teachers, of
creating in them, and in the community, a proper estimate of the true dignity and use-
fulness of the office, of carrying out into practice the soundest views of education, is
to establish at least one institution for their specific training." Some of the objections
that were raised and met by Barnard were that teachers could be trained in colleges,
80 ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF NORMAL SCHOOLS
academies, and private schools, that special training is wasteful owing to the brief
professional career of teachers, that special normal schools cannot turn out sufficient
teachers nor districts pay sufficiently high salaries to encourage training, that the
expense would be great, and, finally, that the normal school was objectionable as a
foreign importation. A committee of eight appointed by the General Assembly
reported in favor of normal schools in 1845, and three years later another commit-
tee, after visiting normal schools in Massachusetts and academies in New York, made
a report similar to that of the earlier committee. In 1850 the movement culminated
in the establishment of the first normal school at New Britain.
THE NEW YOBK PRACTICE
The development of teacher- training in New York State differed from that in
New England. Governor De Witt Clinton urged the establishment of a seminary
for teachers in his message to the legislature in 18£6, but John C. Spencer, chair-
man of the literature committee, insisted that the training of teachers should be
entrusted to the colleges and academies. In 18&7 an act was passed "to provide
permanent funds for the annual appropriation to common schools, to increase the
literature fund, and to promote the education of teachers." Altho no provision was
made immediately for the third purpose, this is the first act in the country for the
education of teachers. A few training departments in academies were reported in
1831. A definite step was taken in 1834, when it was provided that "the trustees
of academies to which any distribution of money shall be made by virtue of this act
shall cause the same to be expended in educating teachers of common schools in
such manner and under such regulations as said Regents shall prescribe." Owing to
inadequate funds, only eight academies were recognized for the purpose, and eight
others were added in 1838. Besides academic subjects, teachers in training were re-
quired to study moral and intellectual philosophy and principles of teaching. In 1840
the Rev. Alonzo Potter of Union College was commissioned by the state superintend-
ent to visit and report on the work of the academies. He found that the teachers in
training were more interested in the academic than the professional studies; they
did not stay for the full length of the course, three years; and no practice teaching
was provided, altho this deficiency was not of importance since most of the students
had already taught. He advocated a course of eighteen months to two years, with
differentiation for teachers in rural schools and primary schools in villages and cities,
and commended the special normal schools of Prussia and France. Such schools, he
declared, "devoted exclusively to the preparation of teachers have some advantage
over any other method." Horace Mannas view on the subject has already been men-
tioned. Spencer, however, continued his opposition, and eight more academies were
recognized as training centres. Colonel Samuel Young, his successor, was of the opinion
in 1843 that the money was diffused over too many schools, and in the following
year, under the influence probably of a report on the Massachusetts normal schools
NORMAL SCHOOLS IN THE UNITED STATES 31
by the Chairman of the Assembly Committee on Colleges, Academies, and Common
Schools,, a bill was passed establishing the State Normal School at Albany, and lead-
ing to the discontinuance of training in the academies. No further progress was made
with the establishment of state institutions until the appropriation of a state grant
to the Oswego Normal School in 186$ and the final adoption of the school as a state
institution four years later.
NORMAL SCHOOL OR ACADEMY ?
The divergent practice in the early training of teachers in New York State and
New England led to interesting discussions of the problem wherever the question
came up. In Michigan John D. Pierce, in his First Annual Report as superintendent
in 1836, advocated the training of teachers at institutions organized upon either the
Prussian or New York models. In 1843, however. Superintendent Ira May hew stated
in his Report, "Normal schools, designed expressly for the education of professional
teachers, are indispensable to the perfection of any system of national education.'"1
A normal school act was passed in 1849, and in 1853 the Ypsilanti school was opened.
In I86& the academy system which had been established in Maine in 1846 was
declared to be a failure, and two normal schools were then established "to be thor-
oughly devoted to the work of training teachers for their professional labors." The
State Superintendent, the Rev. Edward Ballard, declared that "the opinion has been
but too prevalent that a high school or academy can qualify teachers as well for
their work as the institutions especially established for this purpose. . . . But it must
be a fallacious supposition to consider, that the discipline in either of these cases can
be equal to the regular, systematic and thorough drill of the full proposed normal
course." The same problem came up in Wisconsin, when in 1857 the legislature
appropriated twenty-five per cent of the income from swamp lands for normal schools.
Instead of establishing normal schools, the Board of Regents decided to distribute
the money to colleges and academies maintaining normal classes, which were organ-
ized by Henry Barnard, who became agent of the Normal Regents in 1858. The
experiment was not successful, for in 1868 Superintendent J. L. Pickard wrote in his
Report •, "These normal departments of colleges, academies, and high schools have
not satisfactorily met the necessity. They are almost always subordinate departments;
nor will the aid furnished warrant giving them a prominent place. Much good has
been accomplished by these agencies, but they are at present inadequate to the de-
mand. Permanent normal schools are needed, whose sole business shall be the train-
ing of teachers." A normal department was opened in the University in 1863, fol-
lowed by three normal schools in 1866. In his report for that year the Superintendent,
John Gr. McMynn, made a statement on the subject which deserves the consideration
of all who are interested in the professional training of teachers :
"The development of our Normal School system is the most difficult educa-
tional problem that presents itself for solution at the present time. To make
32 ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF NORMAL SCHOOLS
these schools promote the interests of public education, to so conduct them as
to secure for them the confidence of the people, to so manage them as to train
teachers in them for the common schools, to guard against the tendency to
convert them into academies or high schools, to render them so attractive and
so efficient as to bring large numbers of teachers under their influence, and to
carry them on with such economy as to keep their expenses within the income
provided for their support, will demand the watchful care of the people, the
heartiest cooperation of the Legislature, and the greatest discretion and wisdom
of the Board appointed to manage them.
"They may be well attended, the discipline may be excellent and their teach-
ers well qualified; classes may graduate with honor, and the people may cherish a
just pride in the attainments of those who have pursued their course of study;
in fact they may be excellent colleges, but if they are not training schools for
teachers, and if everything else be not kept subordinate to the specific object for
which they were founded, the result will be disastrous, not only to these schools,
but to our whole educational system. The success of Normal Schools in other
states — while it has been such as to warrant a hope that the policy we have
inaugurated may be successfully carried out — has not been so marked and so
uniform as to assure us that we shall not encounter difficulties that prudence,
forecast and energy alone will enable us to overcome."
By 1870 the question had been virtually settled everywhere in favor of normal
schools. The list presented in the Appendix1 gives the date of the first establishment
of state normal schools throughout the country. In some states the schools had been
preceded by training departments in colleges, academies, and high schools; in others,
particularly in the south, by teachers' institutes.
THE NORMAL SCHOOL IN 1866
There was at this time no consensus of opinion or practice on the length of a nor-
mal school course, which varied from one to three years. There was, however, consid-
erable agreement on the content of the curriculum. The course of study adopted in
Massachusetts in 1866 covered a period of two years, and included arithmetic, alge-
bra, geometry, chemistry, grammar and analysis of the English language, rhetoric
and English literature, geography and history, physiology and hygiene, botany and
zoology, natural philosophy, mineralogy and geology, astronomy, mental and moral
science, the civil polity of Massachusetts and the United States, The theory and art
of teaching included principles and methods of instruction, school organization and
government, and the school laws of Massachusetts. The variations that occurred else-
where were due to the influence of Oswegoq at Ypsilanti the course of study introduced
in 1863 included, besides the elementary subjects, object lessons in geography, com-
mon things, colors, geometrical figures, botany, zoology and properties of bodies, and
drawing. At Winona, Minnesota, the "best methods of teaching * went side by side
with the academic study of subject-matter, while the theory and practice of teach-
ing included "intellectual and moral philosophy ; lectures on the principles of edu-
1 See page 418.
NORMAL SCHOOLS IN THE UNITED STATES 33
cation ; history of education ; didactic exercises or sublectures ; observation in model
school; preparation of sketches; criticism lessons in teaching; teaching in practice
school; and school laws of Minnesota." Thus the main lines that were to mark the
future development of the normal school were already laid down when the Missouri
system was inaugurated. Some, at least, of the problems that were later to disturb the
even development of the normal schools appear to have come to the surface. In Mas-
sachusetts, for instance, "the Board [in 1866] deem it unwise to encourage the for-
mation of regular advanced classes, whose instruction cannot fail to divert a con-
siderable amount of the time and attention of the teachers from the undergraduate
course." In general the defects of the day were not unlike those found at a later date.
The students suffered from inadequate preparation and fitness; they did not remain
long enough to profit by the course; the faculties were too small; and on the whole
the normal schools attempted to do too much for pupils of every type.
EARLY VIEW OF THE FUNCTION OF A NOEMAL SCHOOL
It is not out of place to present by way of summary a contemporary view of the
function of the normal school, given in a special Report of the Commissioner of Com-
mon Schools in Ohio presented to the General Assembly in 1866:
66 The course of instruction in most of the Normal Schools of this country is
two years, with a one year's course in a few of them, for teachers of primary
schools. While the one single object is to increase the teaching power of the
student, the exercises have practically a four-fold aim: —
"l.To impart to the student a thorough teaching knowledge of all the
branches ordinarily taught in common schools. This includes not only a mas-
tery of the subjects as knowledge, which is the first requisite for successful teach-
ing, but also a mastery of them as subjects to be taught to others. This is the one
distinctive idea which runs through every lesson and exercise.
"$. To impart to the prospective teacher a practical knowledge of the guiding
principles of his art, and to enable him to reduce such principles to something
like a philosophical system. In other words, the second aim is to teach the science
of education. This is usually sought to be accomplished by lectures.
"3. To impart to the teacher a knowledge of the best methods of instruc-
tion and government, including the methods specially applicable to each stage
of the child's progress and to each branch of knowledge. This part of the course
is sometimes united with the first, each recitation being conducted with a view
of unfolding the true method of teaching the topic. But in all Normal Schools
where instruction in methods of teaching is made duly prominent, separate ex-
ercises are also devoted to the subject.
"4. To impart to the student skill in the art of teaching by an application
of his knowledge of principles and methods in actual practice. For this pur-
pose most Normal Schools have a Model or Experimental Department, in which
the students practice utider the supervision and criticism of a skilled teacher. In
the best Training Schools these model-lessons, as they are called, are made the
basis of instruction in methods. In some Normal Schools the practice of the stu-
dents is obtained by giving model lessons to their own classes/'
34 ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF NORMAL SCHOOLS
B. NOKMAL SCHOOLS IN MISSOURI
For the preparation of teachers in the public schools of Missouri the state has devel-
oped, in addition to the university, six institutions supported, except for certain fees,
wholly by legislative appropriation. Five bear the numbers of the districts that they
serve, and are usually referred to by the name of the city in which they are located.
In the order of their establishment as state schools they are: Kirksville and War-
rensburg, 1870; Cape Girardeau, 1873; Springfield and Maryville, 1906. The sixth,
Lincoln Institute, is a school for colored teachers located at the capital, Jefferson
City. As its problems and conditions differ considerably from those in the other
schools, it is not included in the main discussion.1
EAKLY EFFORTS
Massachusetts was scarcely more than committed to its new institution for train-
ing teachers (1839) when the obvious value of the plan was recognized and similar
schools were advocated by educational officers in many states. In Missouri, except for
the war's interruption, there was a persistent and steadily widening campaign from
184S until the school at Kirksville was established in 1870. State superintendents, and
secretaries of state who served ex officio at times in their stead, urged the usual argu-
ments in annual reports, and one governor (1 844-48) came forward with an elaborate
plan for a combined industrial and pedagogical school. " Home teachers for home
schools" as against inferior "foreign or imported teachers" was a popular cry in a state
where one- fourth of the districts had no teachers, and three-fourths of those that had
teachers secured them from outside the state.2 As to the precise nature of the desired
institution, proposals varied from a normal department in the university to a scheme
for an independent school in each congressional district — eight in all; but the only
early legislation on the subject was an act of 1849 establishing a professorship of the-
ory and practice of teaching in the state university, and a system of two-year scholar-
ships for each county — all to be financed with an annual appropriation of $1000.
The university took no action. In 1856 the Missouri State Teachers Association at
its first session passed resolutions in support of normal schools, possibly inspired
thereto by Horace Mann, who attended the meetings. This movement had local effect
the following year in the establishment of the St. Louis City Normal School, later
known as the Harris Teachers College. But the war halted the efforts for state schools
until, at its meeting ten years later (1866), the reorganized teachers association took
up the subject again in an emphatic memorial to the General Assembly.
JOSEPH BALDWIN
The prospect was not unfavorable, therefore, when, in 1867, Joseph Baldwin came
from Indiana to open his normal school at Kirksville. Altho a private venture, it
1 See page 385.
2 House Journal, 1857, 19th Adj. Sess., Appendix, pages 116, 117.
NORMAL SCHOOLS IN MISSOURI 25
was started as an avowed forerunner of a state system, and Baldwin entered at once
into an energetic campaign to place it on that footing. As a leading figure In the pro-
fessional education of teachers in Missouri for the next dozen years Joseph Baldwin
deserves more than passing notice. Born in Pennsylvania in 18S7 and educated at
Bethany College in Virginia, he early sought the frontier, teaching for four years in
western Missouri — 1852-56. During the next eleven years he conducted four dif-
ferent normal schools in Indiana and Pennsylvania, attended a fifth, and served a
year in the army. He apparently found his work when he came to Kirksville, for his
subsequent career was more stable. A man of modest scholarship, Baldwin seems to
have been a noble, strongly emotional soul, who took up his cause with the ardor of
an evangelist. He was himself an elder in the Church of the Disciples of Christ, and
selected two ordained ministers as his first assistants. For all of them the educational
appeal was a veritable gospel, and this became and long remained the note of the
whole normal school movement in Missouri. The primary task has been to arouse and
inspire country boys and girls, usually handicapped by lack of funds and defective
early training, to secure an education. Large numbers of normal school teachers have
labored to this end with splendid, almost apostolic, zeal and have done an incalcula-
ble amount of good.
THEEE STATE INSTITUTIONS AUTHOKIZED
In 1870, after much agitation and several unsuccessful attempts, legislation was
finally secured providing for two institutions to be controlled by a single, central
board of seven men, the location of the schools to be auctioned off to the towns mak-
ing the highest bids in land and cash appropriations. A third institution for south-
east Missouri was voted in 1873. The change from a central board to local boards in
1874 will be discussed later; but space may be taken here to comment on this method
of locating state educational institutions — the method followed in all subsequent
cases.
METHOD OF LOCATING EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS
The principle seems to be based on the assumption that to have any particular
community profit by the presence of a state institution is intolerable, but as such
advantage cannot well be avoided, the community should first be made to pay as much
as possible for the privilege. While the financial saving to a wealthy state is negli-
gible, the community paying the bonus has generally laid its plans to " take it out of
the school" at the first opportunity, thus winning for the new institution not friends
but exploiters, wh0 claim not only legitimate business but often " jobs." In 1871
Superintendent Monteith protested against a plan that engendered "so much of local
strife and bitterness besides tempting an ambitious community to assume a burden
of taxation heavier than they are able to bear."" l Warrensburg was forced to repudi-
1 State Report, 1871 , -page 20,
86 ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF NORMAL SCHOOLS
ate $50,000 of her pledge of $£00,000, and Rolla, after securing the state school of
mines with the help of a bond issue of $75,000, succumbed in a similar fashion by
going to court and proving the action to have been taken in an unconstitutional
manner. Even when in possession the towns have had to defend their title : when the
university was destroyed by fire, the people of Columbia were literally " held up" for
a fresh bonus of $50,000.
Aside from entirely ignoring the educational merits of the problem, the bad effects
of this system have been marked. Kirksville and Chillicothe were involved in a bitter
legal wrangle over the first school in the northern district. The Springfield institution
narrowly escaped going to a border town, Webb City, a fate which, perhaps not un-
luckily, overtook the third district school because of Cape Girardeau's four thousand
dollar margin over Ironton in a property valuation, altho Cape Girardeau was at the
time sixteen miles from a railroad. To its decided detriment the fifth district school
was located at Maryville, all but out of the state; while Warrensburg, on a single
railroad and but one county distant from Kansas, won over Sedalia, a thriving and
more centrally located town, which in 1871 was connected in five of the six different
directions in which its railroads radiate to-day, The dear lesson from Missouri's expe-
rience is that state schools should be located by a competent educational commimon on
educational considerations only, and that the state should pay all the bills.
CHANGJES IN STATUS AND IN SCOPE OF WORK, 1871-1914
As originally planned and as conducted for the first thirty years of their history,
the normal schools offered a four-year course based approximately upon the gradua-
tion requirements of the elementary school. A convenient break came at the end of
the first two years, and during this early period by far the larger number of students
took only this preliminary work, — the majority, probably, only the first year either
in whole or in part. A preparatory year long paralleled the upper grade work for
mature students who had not completed the elementary school; and a graduate
honor was offered for successful experience and a course of reading. Practice schools
were contemplated from the outset, and have been maintained except for certain lean
years when lack of funds forced their suspension. The summer session, which is now
more largely attended than all others, was first introduced as a private venture of the
faculty at Warrensburg in 1894,1 and has had an extraordinary gix>wth, due not a
little to favoring legislation 2 whereby successful attendance could be counted in lieu
of examinations for certificates.
Until 1904 the schools could be technically rated only as secondary institutions.
Their character was in fact somewhat different. Most of the advanced students were
mature men and women, who had had some, often considerable, experience as teach-
ers; they were a select group with unusually industrious habits, and could not fairly
1 State Report, 1896, page 85,
2 Ibid., 1902, page 2 ; 1906, pagre 16.
NORMAL SCHOOLS IN MISSOURI 37
be compared with the strictly secondary type of student. There were some also who
had received a secondary education elsewhere, and were taking only the professional
work of the normal school. With such a body of students the transition to a genuine
collegiate status seemed a simple matter.
In 1904 an agreement between the three existing schools had the effect shortly of
placing the last two years of the four-year course on a time level with early college
work. High school graduates were given credit for ten of the eighteen units in the
four-year "normal" course, and as the number of high school graduates steadily in-
creased, the last eight units came eventually to correspond to the first two collegiate
years. For a while thereafter the first two years of the "normal" course were made to
do duty for the entire high school period by fitting in more or less elastic prepara-
tory terms. For a considerable time also the high school graduates took their profes-
sional work in low grade classes with students of less training. Gradually, however,
the first two years were expanded into a four-year high school course, professional
work was largely deferred to the collegiate years, and the present organization ap-
peared. Coincident with the change of 1904 was the projection of two "post-gradu-
ate" -years leading to the degree of Bachelor of Arts, which included the single year
of advanced residence work, recognized by the degree of Master of Pedagogy, that
had been announced shortly before.
GEOWTH IN NUMBERS
The success of the summer school with its favorable effect on the total enrolment1
has tended to obscure the actual extent of institutional growth during the recent
period of expansion. The average attendance from term to term at Warrensburg's
regular session, taken over a period of six years, 1893 to 1898, was six hundred
thirty-one, and from 1911 to 191 4i it was seven hundred nine, or a gain of twelve per
cent. Cape Girardeau shows an increase from two hundred forty-four to four hun-
dred sixty-three, or ninety per cent; and Kirksville, from four hundred fifty-eight
to six hundred thirty-three, or thirty-eight per cent.2 For a period of sixteen years
of recent development in this type of normal school a joint increase of thirty-five
per cent is certainly moderate, and is much nearer the truth than an apparent gain
of one hundred forty per cent based on the total annual enrolment. The two new
schools at Springfield and Mary ville, established midway in this period, may appear
to have checked the growth of the others. As a matter of fact, however, these have
served sections of the state that were ill represented before.3
1 For an expression of the enrolment of 1914 in terms of a standard unit of enrolment for one year, see page 428.
2 At Cape Girardeau the facts were available for only four of the six years in the first period. At Kirksville the
average attendance from 1893 to 1898 was lacking, but was inferred to be seventy-one per cent of the average total
enrolment in the regular session, this being about the proportion at the other twa schools.
8 In 1916 over half of Maryville's spring enrolment (268) was from the local county, and with those from counties
immediately adjoining, made up seventy per cent of the school's total attendance. Greene County, in which Spring-
field is located, sent one student to the regular session at Warrensburg in 1904-05, the year before the school was
established at Springfield, but sent 274 to Springfield in 1914. Six contiguous counties sent ten to Warrensburg in
1904-05 as compared with 188 to Springfield in 1914. Nine per cent only of the regular session students at Warrens-
burg in 1904-05 came from counties in the present Springfield district.
38 ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF NORMAL SCHOOLS
OPPOSITION
It was a decade or more after their organization before the schools could be said
to be secure in public opinion. Attempts at abolition were initiated in every legisla-
ture but one from 1871 to 1883.1 The constitution of 1875 protected the university,
but left the normal schools at the mercy of statutory law; they therefore shared the
fluctuating support of the public school system itself in a community where the tra-
dition of the free public school was not yet strong. Throughout the seventies the
catalogues annually devote several pages to general defence; in 1880 the Kirks ville
bulletin declared : " Success has been achieved in the face of stupendous difficulties. To
secure the necessary means seemed a hopeless task. At every step bitter and determined
opposition has been encountered. Public sentiment in Missouri was largely opposed
to popular education, and hence opposed to Normal Schools, the best means of elevat-
ing the common schools.1"1 Superintendent Shannon considered that the definite resolu-
tions of support secured in the Democratic Convention of 1880 marked the end of this
opposition,2 altho as late as 1895 President Osborne of Wairensburg observed that
"in some sections of the state there is strong opposition to the employment of Normal
School graduates.1"13 The position of the schools was further embarrassed by the pro-
nounced objection of envious towns that saw in them only local benefits. They charged
the. state with supporting institutions to take the place of local high schools. Even
the small elementary practice schools were attacked as so much further aid to local
education. These critics pointed chiefly to the high proportion of local attendance
that has characterized all of the normal schools from the beginning — a feature that
is marked even after allowing for residents attracted to the town by the school itself.
FINANCIAL STRUGGLES
The struggle for existence, altho finally successful, kept the schools impoverished
and uncertain of their future. At Kirksville the state spent $50,000 to finish the plant
after the county had laid out $75,000. But Cape Girardeau alone built the first home
for its school at a cost of $50,000, and Warrensburg, after spending $150,000, waited
ten years for $10,000 from the state with which to complete its building. In the mean-
time, at Warrensburg (1880) teachers gave up part of their salaries to obtain money
enough to finish off rooms in which to teach, and students gave entertainments to pay
for the sidewalks. The annual appropriation to each school was reduced in 1877 from
$10,000 to $7500, and at Kirksville two-thirds of that was long held up by the audi-
tor. As late as 1898, the state appropriations at Warrensburg lacked $5000 of the
amount needed to pay the teachers alone ; and for over twenty-five years this school had
no appropriations for library or apparatus, the necessary sums being eked out with
small incidental fees, or with tuition from students not pledged to teach or coming
from outside the state.4
1 History of the Mrst District State Normal School, by E. M. Violette, 1905, page 82. a State Report, 1880, page 35.
8 Ibid., 1895, page 85. * For a complete list of biennial expenditures from appropriations, see pag-e 441.
NORMAL SCHOOLS IN MISSOURI 39
EFFECT OF POVERTY ON THE SCHOOLS
This policy of near-starvation could not fail to react seriously on the operation and
reputation of the schools. In fact, continued financial embarrassment in the face of a
pressing opportunity seems to have been the principal cause of their weakness. Every
new student that could be corralled, and every old student that could be retained, was
valuable both for his fees and as a means of additional pressure on the legislature for
more funds. What this led to educationally is seen in President Osborne's protest in
1886: "The classes are necessarily very large, numbering, in some instances, from sixty
to seventy members. This renders proper classification impossible under the circum-
stances. The teachers are overworked, their best efforts are checkmated by a bad clas-
sification, and both discipline and scholastic acquirements suffer in consequence."1 Yet
there were few attempts to hold the numbers within limits consistent with good re-
sults. In 1889 Warrensburg did raise the age of admission for girls to sixteen, the
same as for boys, and President Osborne notes that "this change considerably reduced
the rate of increase in attendance for the year 1890, but the enrolment is still much
too large for the number of teachers employed."'"' 2 Kirksville and Cape Girardeau de-
clined to follow.
Consequently it is not surprising to find State Superintendent Coleman, himself a
product of the normal school, declaring in 1889: "One real trouble has always existed
in our normal schools : the students try to do the work required in too short a time.
The course of study is not too comprehensive, but students are admitted too young
on too low a standard of scholarship, and then pushed too rapidly."3 He urges the
elimination of all primary work, a minimum age of sixteen for admission, and a rea-
sonable four-year curriculum that actually requires four years. Of course very young
students, rapid promotion, and the consequent early diploma or degree, mean more
students ; and, paradoxically perhaps, by holding out a degree close at hand, these
policies mean longer attendance by each student, thus bringing us again to the funda-
mental consideration — enrolment. All of these tendencies in the normal schools
have persisted almost if not quite to the present day, and appear distinctly traceable
to the legislator's policy that considers gross enrolment as the main justification for
increased appropriations.
RELATIONS WITH COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES
Conditions such as these were inevitably reflected in the opinion of outside insti-
tutions with which the normal school came into competition. Reference is made here
not to the several "private normals7' and small denominational colleges, most of which
have since disappeared, — schools that from time to time made common cause in at-
tacking the certificate privileges of the normal schools, and that on at least two occa-
sions4 came close to success. It is a question rather of the reputation of the state nor-
1 State Eeport, 1886, page 119. 2 Ibid., 1890, pagre 114.
8 Ibid.* 1889, page 27. * 1895 and 1905, See Violette, op. cit., page 83.
40 ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF NORMAL SCHOOLS
mal schools among the stronger institutions of recognized collegiate standing. These
colleges., to be sure, had secondary departments, and were therefore in direct compe-
tition with the normal schools ; the university itself maintained such a department
until 1893. Furthermore, many normal school students and nearly all graduates were
as old as the average college student. President Baldwin had projected an institution
which, in his phrase, was to become the "peer of the college," and which did at first
essay many college subjects. Conditions which it could not control, however, soon
brought the normal school to the level of its low admission requirements ; while its
advanced classes were left empty, it was overrun with elementary, short time students;
and its financial support was such as to make good educational standards impossible
in handling such large numbers.
On the other hand, the university and the better colleges were steadily climbing
upward; admission requirements were gradually advanced; students entered at least
for the year and usually for the entire course. While the normal schools were neces-
sarily local in their sympathies, the colleges, and particularly the university, were seek-
ing their places in the larger fraternity of scholars, and were jealous of the standards
that placed them there. The normal schools were victims of an isolated statutory and
economic situation that governed completely the material with which they dealt and
the terms of their own operation, while the higher schools were lifted and carried
along more or less by the current of national educational opinion.
It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that with no agency at hand to bring about
and maintain a mutual understanding, friction should arise the moment the question
of recognition of credit appeared. The nature of entrance requirements and the method
of their enforcement; the basis on which advanced standing is accepted; the whole sys-
tem of school credit for promotion and graduation; the organization and sequence of
courses; the accuracy and completeness of classification; the training of instructors
and the conditions under which they work, — questions like these become vital when
institutions agree to a mutual interchange of accounts; and it is around these points
that the criticisms by other institutions have centred. These criticisms became acute
when the normal schools began consciously to provide for the preparation of teachers
for high schools. High schools in Missouri have sprung largely from the elementary
school system, and have carried up out of the elementary ranks the best of the ele-
mentary teachers. For small schools there was no alternative. Finding themselves thus
in possession of the field, the normal schools have naturally and very fortunately as-
sumed the burden of making these high school teachers as good as possible. Meanwhile
the strong, fully accredited high schools the country over have in general desired a
college- trained staff. Consequently as weak schools became strong schools the problem
grew more perplexing. Can the normal school give as suitable and thorough training
for high school teachers as the college ? If not, why not?
In the absence of a state authority empowered to study and accommodate the situa-
tion, controversy has run high both in Missouri and elsewhere, and has done injustice
NORMAL SCHOOLS IN MISSOURI 41
to both parties. The service performed by the normal schools has been in itself worthy
and devoted. They have been a powerful and ceaseless leaven of righteousness and
progress operating where no other existing force could operate. This fact all honest
observers must recognize. Their achievement should not be obscured or belittled by
criticisms aroused thru their aspirations for academic rating. It is inevitable and
proper in view of their past history, however, that if such rating be accorded, the nor-
mal schools should demonstrate their fulfilment of the standards by which they seek
to be judged. Such fulfilment can hardly be by affirmation merely; the burden of proof
rests with them.
IV
GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL OF MISSOURI NORMAL SCHOOLS
A. THE PIIESENT SYSTEM
CONTROL FIRST VESTED IN A SINGLE BOARD
AT the time of their establishment the responsible oversight of the state normal schools
was lodged with a single board of regents. As this arrangement is in marked contrast
with the multiple board system of to-day to which it was shortly changed, its main
features together with the reasons for its discontinuance are of interest.
The board was created by act of the legislature at its session in 1870; it was to
consist, in addition to the three ew-officio members of the State Board of Education,
of four men appointed by the governor, two of whom were to be chosen from the coun-
ties north of the Missouri River, and two from the counties south of the river, these
being the districts proposed for the two schools then projected. In the attempted
legislation of 1869 and in the original drafts of 1870, when first six and then four
schools were planned, the control contemplated was the same — a board first of fif-
teen,1 then of eleven members.2 This plan appears to have been persistently adhered
to by the promoters of the movement; they evidently thought of the work of these
schools as the same throughout; duplication was resorted to for the sake of geograph-
ical convenience, but a single aim was to be defined and attained by a single man-
agement. With this idea the board located its first two schools, and drew up common
courses of study and common regulations for their operation. But serious opposition
was aroused in the agitation over location.3 Charges of corruption long hampered the
board in its work.
OBJECTIONS TO THE SINGLE BOARD
Aided by such recent experience, southeast Missouri with aggressive sectional zeal
brought it about that the school assigned to it in 1873 should be entrusted to a sepa-
rate board, in which the appointive members should all be local. This wedge afforded
a good opening for an attack on the central board. Other districts felt that they might
obtain a school more readily if all schools were locally controlled than if they had to
deal with a centralized management.4 It was the practice at the time to turn over the
entire legislative appropriation for an institution to its regents immediately after ap-
proval. Communities that had bled themselves to secure their respective schools con-
sidered it intolerable that five or ten thousand dollars that would belong eventually
to them should be held up for months. As the handling of the money seemed to be
clearly theirs, it appeared likewise an infringement of their dignity to have even the
educational affairs of the institution controlled from a distance* So firmly fixed was
1 House Journal, 1869, page 256. * Ibid,, 1870, pages 299-301. 8 See page 35.
4 This and certain other statements in this section are made on the authority of conversations with persons actively
interested in' this movement at the time.
THE PRESENT SYSTEM 43
this idea of local proprietorship that later, under the new order, the whole board
of the Second District School, except the state superintendent, was at first drawn
from the one county, three being citizens of Warrensburg. Even the normal school
teachers were opposed to the central board, as appears in a resolution of the Kirks-
ville faculty of December IS, 1873.1
SEPARATE BOARDS — CONTEMPORARY CRITICISM
The old plan gave way in 1874, and was followed by the present system — a board
for each school consisting of the state superintendent ex officio and six others. These
are appointed from thelocal district by the governor in three classes of two each for six
years instead of four as previously; at least one member of the board to be a resident
of the county in which the school is located. The extension of term and the elimina-
tion of two of the ew-officio members — the secretary of state and the attorney-gen-
eral— were clearly steps in the right direction. An amendment of 1889, by requiring
that not more than four regents belong to any one political party, completed the
present arrangement. This proviso seems to have done away with the most flagrant
political abuses of the new plan ; a strong minority of three being usually able to
make itself felt.
As to just how the new scheme worked in its early days we have no information ex-
cept thru cautious public utterances of officials. Two of these are unequivocal enough
regarding its educational features, and state admirably the principles which later
experience has in general shown to be correct. State Superintendent John Monteith,
after seeing the new plan in operation for nearly a year, reports as follows:
"Organization for the conduct and government of the State Normals is yet, as
I think, quite far from what it should be. The new law of last winter, in many
respects good, does not provide the best system of control No large school of
the class under consideration can prosper, unless at its head is jplaced an accom-
plished President, learned, of excellent executive ability, and fitted for his spe-
cialty. When such a head is secured the school is better with the least possi-
ble outside government. This Director" should, to a very large extent, be held
responsible for the careful and wise conduct of the school. I am, therefore, op-
posed to the system of local boards. A general board to supervise the whole
system of schools, with executive committees to visit and attend to the business
of each individual school, is found by experience to be far better. It is cheaper.
It unifies the general features of the schools without impairing their individu-
ality."2
Montejth's successor, Dr. R. D. Shannon, began his service with 1875. Looking back
on bis double term of office in 1882, he says:
"By the harmonious cooperation of the boards of regents of the several Normal
schools, they have been brought much nearer to a common standard within the
last six years. But this is merely a fortuitous circumstance controlled by no in-
fluence stronger than the pleasant and agreeable relations between boards sep-
* Violette, op. oit., page 193. 8 State Report, 1874, page 17.
4* GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
arated by great distance and ignorant both of each other and of the conditions
and needs of the schools over which they do not preside. ... As there can be
but one policy upon the part of the State with reference to these institutions,
— since the interests of all sections are identical as to education, and demand
the same qualifications upon the part of teachers and the same methods of in-
struction— it would be better to secure perfect uniformity in the courses of in-
struction and perfect harmony in the management of these schools by placing
three of them under a single board."1
ATTEMPTS TO UNIFY THE SCHOOLS EDUCATIONALLY
In 1874, in view of the dissolution of the central board that was just then taking
place. President Baldwin of Kirksville urged a joint committee of presidents to pass
upon applications for graduation,2 doubtless with the idea that this would also help
to keep the schools together. In his next report he pleads for "unity of plan, harmony
of action, and hearty cooperation"3 among all the state institutions. President Cheney
of Cape Girardeau, in his report of the same year, put first among his needs "the same
course or courses of study for all these schools," and "the same conditions of grad-
uation in all. 'H All these desiderata were secured by Superintendent Shannon thru
conference, and for ten years the joint board of presidents that President Baldwin
had suggested went from school to school as an effective body for educational control.
The result was marked; President Osborne of Warrensburg declared: "The value of
these measures in bringing about unity in the normal work can scarcely be overesti-
mated. The tendency of a common course of study towards this end is at once appar-
ent;" and he saw in it a "means of annually comparing results and thus promoting a
generous rivalry."5 But a union held only by 'this voluntary personal tie was bound to
dissolve as the individuals changed, and the schools drifted apart. Not until 1899 did
they succeed in bringing about another common course of study. In 1904 they united,
with important reservations on the part of Kirksville, in essential administrative
arrangements, and corrected these again in 1914; the important agreement of 1916
will be mentioned later. These occasional seasons of harmony — all voluntary and oc-
curring only when the situation had become bad — were, however, merely incidents
in long periods of marked divergence. In fact, since 1899 attempts to unite on a cur-
riculum have been abandoned entirely, and each institution has been busy following
the particular vision of its own leader, who calls the procedure "meeting local con-
ditions," or "developing the genius of the institution," or "satisfying the demands of
the people," or "upholding democracy in education," as the case may be.
PRESENT OPERATION OF THE SEPARATE BOARDS
This review of the early changes in organization and of the fitful and futile efforts
of the heads of the institutions to secure united action, at least in their educational
1 State Report, 1882, page xii. 2 Ibid., 1874, page 45. 8 Ibid., 1875, page 188.
4 Ibid. , 1875, page 195. e Ibid. , 1878, page 283.
THE PRESENT SYSTEM 45
function, brings us to a general examination of the system as it appears to operate
to-day. A careful study of the personnel of the several boards of regents was not made.
Present or past members of each board were Interviewed, in certain cases repeatedly
and at some length. The character of these gentlemen would indicate that, on the
whole, the boards have represented a high average of general ability. Some mem-
bers have served their respective institutions for from twenty to thirty years, the
tendency in some places, particularly at Cape Girardeau, being toward rather stable
membership. The additions year by year reflect, of course, the qualities of the gov-
ernor who appoints them, but on the whole it is improbable that this method of
selection will anywhere provide a better group of men. The one remediable defect in
the present system is the rapidity with which the boards may change, in spite of
a six-year term. Owing to death or resignation it has occurred several times recently
that three members have changed in a single biennium, and even in the natural course
of events a governor who so desires may change four members, or a majority of the
board, within his single term of office. Moreover, the elective state superintendent is
likely to change within the same period, making an almost complete overturn of the
group. When it is remembered that the one condition of the successful operation of a
lay board is that the replacements be made slowly enough to enable the head of the
school and the older members of the board to educate the newcomers to a sound con-
ception of their duties, it will be seen that changes now come too fast; to say nothing
of the unwisdom of having the whole character of the board subject to the ideas of any
one governor. The board may and often does come together but once or twice a year,
and its opportunity to study the situation may be very slight; one new member in each
biennium would allow sufficient elasticity, and would at the same time ensure a stable
and as well-informed a membership as the nature of the selections would permit.
FUNCTION OF A BOARD NOT UNDERSTOOD
It is to a lack of knowledge of their duties on the part of board members that many
of the internal difficulties of the schools are directly traceable. Most students of edu-
cation will agree that efficient control of an educational institution involves broadly
two kinds of responsibility: first, the care that the concrete processes of education —
study and instruction, training and testing — shall go forward with the maximum
speed and thoroughness; and second, solely for the sake of the first, that the material
means and equipment — buildings, apparatus, and salaries — shall be adequately and
economically supplied, A third responsibility, lacking which the otiber two may be
met in vain, is not so generally discerned, namely, that the aim of the institution
shall be continually reconsidered in the light of changing situations and promptly
and wisely readjusted. Under modern conditions all of these obligations are tasks for
well -trained men giving their entire time to their work, if the business of preparing
teachers is to be prosecuted with success equal to that even of a modern manufactur-
ing concern.
46 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
WHAT is THE FUNCTION OF A BOARD OF REGENTS ?
What, then, is the function of the regents? By good fortune the field work of this
study was begun with the school at Mary ville at a meeting with the board of regents
of that institution, where the impression, subsequently confirmed by the head of the
school, was gained that almost ideal conditions existed between school and board. A
perusal of the state reports later revealed a letter from the president of this board —
then president of the local school board — giving his views as to the function of a school
board. We cannot do better than quote this in part:
"Upon one side is democracy represented by the Board of Education, and upon
the other a cultured institution. Between the two as an intermediary is the super-
intendent. The relation of the board to the community is somewhat analogous to
that of the superintendent to the board. While some of the duties of the board
are fixed by legal enactment, many of them are by implication. It is its duty to
look after the highest welfare of the institution intrusted to its care. It is also its
duty to lead the community to recognize what is best in education. As the Board
represents a culture higher than the general culture of the community, and as
its closer relations with the school and supervising officers give to it a wider and
better view than the views of the community, the work of the Board becomes
directly educative, and its duty, manifestly, is to inform and direct the commu-
nity. ... It [the Board] is a non-professional organization with work to be done
requiring very high professional wisdom and skill. The whole complex organiza-
tion of the school and its work in detail may come within the scope of its offi-
cial observations, but at the suggestion and under the direction of the superin-
tendent. He becomes for it the measure of its efficient service. It should exact of
him the greatest vigilance and the most painstaking accuracy, and it has a right
to expect of him candor and frankness. Upon the other hand it should be guided
by his wisdom and influenced by his recommendations, and it must honor him
with its confidence and loyalty."1
If these principles hold of a municipal school system, they should be doubly sacred
in a higher professional institution. The all-important business of a board is to keep
a first-class executive at the head, and then the less government the better, as Super-
intendent Monteith said forty years ago. Many normal school regents in Missouri
apparently fail to discover this, and exceedingly few realize it at the time of their
appointment. To the excellent and devoted men who have seen clearly, who have
spent their best energies in securing a thoroughly trained, experienced, and able man,
and have then buttressed his efforts both in school and community with an eye solely
to the success of the school, are due the good results already achieved. But the labor
of dealing successfully with those gentlemen who either from igno.rance or self-interest
do not have this point of view is out of all proportion to the results. Not understand-
ing the true relation it irks them to be, as they say, "a mere rubber stamp" — a feel-
ing that does credit to their conscience if not to their intelligence. They have been
appointed; they must justify that appointment by action; and the action taken usually
1 State Report, 1904, page 55.
THE PRESENT SYSTEM 47
tries the nerve of the president and his readiness to sacrifice everything for his pro-
fessional integrity. If he stands the test, the fight is usually won; if he yields, however
little, to what he knows to be professionally wrong, he is the tool and toy of that
board thereafter. For the sake of the school such a test of real presidential timber
would not be a bad thing, if boards would only drop the timid and reward the brave;
but that is not their way. Even at Maryville, at the time of organization, the first
board, and not the president, selected the school's first faculty regardless of profes-
sional considerations ; the strategic importance of a teacher in the new district or his
personal relationship seems to have played the important role. In another school, much
more recently, the leading member of the faculty, next to the president, was ousted in
spite of the protest of the president's renewed nomination — and the president re-
mained ! Two of the boards have recently elected members of their own body to posi-
tions of profit in the schools without the consent of the presidents concerned, and by
one of them a field agent with whom the president cannot cooperate has been main*
tained upon the payroll for years in face of the president's direct opposition. The
latter bokrd will not only make appointments distasteful to the president, but will
invite and encourage direct dealings with faculty members, especially with such as are
willing to use this method of raising their salaries, and at its annual meeting will
determine the whole faculty schedule, ignoring the president and reflecting him last.
So far as appeared, the school at Cape Girardeau has been free from mismanagement
of this sort.
Even when board members will not openly oppose the prerogative of the educa-
tional head in planning the efficiency of his institution, there is a subtler pressure
which the bravest executive resists with difficulty, namely, the tendency to shape
nominations and proposals partly to suit the known preferences of the board when
these are made apparent. A board that cannot abstain from such expression and that
neglects to reinforce not only a president's right but his complete responsibility for
the personnel of his corps, runs great risk of leading him to sacrifice excellence in
a well-meant desire for "harmony."
PARTY POLITICS IN THE BOAKDS
However ridden with school politics certain of the normal schools appear to have
been, and to be, there apparently has been, until very recently, a marked freedom from
party politics in the operations of the boards. A vain effort from high party author-
ities to foist off on a courageous president a "lame" party politician as a teacher dis-
closes an always latent tendency ; in this case the board seems to have loyally protected
its leader from punishment. Still more instructive and deplorable from every point of
view was the recent apparent attempt to pay a political debt with the presidency of the
school at Warrensburg. The proposed beneficiary, a personally attractive and capable
gentleman and an active party worker possessing strong political connections, was
a man with but a fragment of even a college education, and without administrative
48 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
training or experience that would qualify him for such a post. A vacancy was created
by dropping a man of the opposite party who for nine years had served the school,
and under whose charge it had enjoyed extraordinary growth and prosperity. From
all that could be learned, furthermore, this was accomplished without the faintest
pretence at basing the procedure on educational or professional grounds. With plans
well laid the board proceeded to the election of a new president, but the alumni were so
aroused, and the upheaval among the teachers of the school became so threatening at
the prospect of a leader inferior in training and experience to most of themselves, not
to mention the grossness of the political barter involved, that the board's courage
weakened. Fortunately the minority nominee was a choice on which it would have been
difficult to improve — a man with collegiate and graduate preparation and a conspicu-
ously successful experience of some length at the Warrensburg school; on him the
board finally united. It is little short of a disaster when for any reason an educational
institution falls into the hands of a person not qualified to direct it. This was happily
prevented at Warrensburg. It is, however, a moral disaster complete and overwhelm-
ing when seven trustees of an institution, or a majority of them, prove false to their
official duty on the occasion which is the chief reason for their existence as trustees*
Such a calamity the outcome can scarcely be said to have averted,
WEAKNESS OF THE BOAEDS IN MATERIAL AS WELL AS IN EDUCATIONAL PBOBLEMS
The boards do their best work in handling the questions of the second group cited
above, namely,, those growing out of the material equipment and financial mainte-
nance of the institution. Here the criticism of experienced and successful laymen is
of great value, but may be overdone, as is proved in the case where a much needed
increase in salaries — the paramount consideration of a good school — was held up
for years by an active regent, who could see only the need for an enlarged equipment
and campus improvement. Under this head falls also the paralyzing practice alleged
and apparently true, of some boards, of judging the worth of a teacher, and his con-
sequent differential treatment in salary, on the basis .of the number of students that he
can enroll in his classes. Again, Missouri boards have been known to erect buildings
and to exclude the head of the school from even an advisory participation in plan-
ning the structure he is to use. In all these situations the educational consideration
should obviously come first, and the judgment of those men who are trained and paid
to know should prevail.
in the important responsibilities of the third class mentioned — those of studying
and redefining the aim of the school — the board of regents is naturally helpless. Not
only is the average local regent incapable, thru lack of data, of judging what the
exact aim and scope of the school should be; he is predisposed thru his local and
sectional sympathies to favor any and all developments of the institution that will
serve a purely local or sectional end. If it is proposed to have a college instead of
a normal school, he is in favor of it, of course; shall an agricultural and commercial
THE PRESENT SYSTEM 49
trade school be added, he sees great advantages; shall courses for new types of teach-
ers be advertised, he agrees at once, if the new departure will enroll more students.
The problems involved are highly technical, and he is perforce at the mercy of his
chief educational adviser. Here any energetic and plausible president can work his
will, especially if he can show — a matter of deplorable facility — that "it won't cost
much, if any, more."
LACK OF UNITY IN POLICIES AFFECTING THE WHOLE STATE
The system bears its full fruit When it becomes, as in Missouri, a question not of
a single institution, but of a series of institutions established for one well-understood
purpose — to provide a good teacher for every school position in the state. Here are
five schools with independent local boards as described above, and a sixth, the uni-
versity, having a general board representing the entire state. All are preparing teach-
ers, and all are supported by state taxation. The state has a maximum need which all
the schools together, with the most complete cooperation, could scarcely meet, yet no
means exists of coordinating the efforts made by each in a practical solution of the
common problem. In the five normal schools it was probably intended that the state
superintendent should be the unifying factor common to all boards. This officer, how-
ever, is himself elective and without much aubhority. He is a convenient counselor to
the presidents and occasionally to the boards, but as related to the latter, his posi-
tion, in the opinion of at least two recent incumbents of the office, is isolated and
relatively without influence. If he were himself a trained and responsible appointive
officer, and if then normal school boards could elect their presidents only on his nom-
ination, and change their curricula only with his approval, he could do the state a
great service thru his grasp of its problem as a whole.
EACH SCHOOL A LAW UNTO ITSELF
In the absence of any coordinating authority, each school moves solely in its own
interest. Its winnings from the legislature are in fairly direct proportion to the politi-
cal influence exerted by the president or board members. Activity of this sort is in-
cessant and skilfully directed, but that educational considerations play but a minor
role in the apportionments is evident from the striking inequalities that exist. While
the school at Cape Girardeau is luxuriously housed in a fine plant including four school
buildings and two dormitories, Springfield, with an annual enrolment of several hun-
dred more students, has been obliged to endure years of excessive crowding in the sin-
gle structure with which it started. It is a situation true to type, for in 1896 the same
institution at Cape Girardeau, with an annual enrolment then of three hundred and
ten, secured an appropriation for building four separate halls for the exclusive use of
as many literary societies, when the school at Warrensburg, enrolling annually over
nine hundred students, was unable to secure money enough to pay its teachers. A sys-
tem that admits of such extremes is bad; the state is merely doling out funds in the
50 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
dark where the personal or sectional pressure is greatest, and must continue to do so
until it concludes to entrust its biennial offering for the training of teachers to a sin-
gle, central board competent to make a rational distribution on the basis of proved
educational requirements.
EDUCATIONAL DIVERSITY OF THE "INSTITUTIONS
In their educational aspects the five schools are as diversified as tho they were in
separate states. They are all dealing with the same kind of student for the same
final purpose in the same state community, yet their terminology, their standards
of value, and their methods of educational bookkeeping are quite unlike; and the
content of their curricula, their graduation requirements, and their organization of
fundamental features are widely divergent, the practice in each school expressing either
the inherited tradition or the will of the present head, modified in some schools to
an extent by the action of the faculty. Nevertheless, they cannot escape one another.
When a student offers himself to all in turn, indicating that he may be had by the
highest bidder for the uncertain credentials he has to offer, the losers naturally suspect
the winner. Three schools told of losing students to other schools where graduation
was effected with unexpected speed. One institution offered flatly in its catalogue to
meet "whatever favors either of the other schools will grant and no more."" In the
matter of entrance requirements this independent attitude has had noticeably bad
effect. In 190& two of the schools desired to standardize terms of admission by accept-
ing on certificate only students from approved high schools and taking others on exam-
ination. The third preferred to take in all alike and "prove them up," that is, admit
them to class and throw responsibility on a teacher anxious to increase his enrolment.
Thus the first two were virtually compelled to adopt that method or suffer the con-
sequences, and the high schools were denied this much needed support by the institu-
tions that should have done most to strengthen them.
Loss TO THE SCHOOLS OF CRITICAL REVISION
This interplay of uncertain relations is not the major defect. The real weakness in
the situation is the loss to each institution of the tonic effect that would follow were it
obliged to keep its practice overhauled under the critical eyes of competent outsiders
either from other schools or from the state department. Such criticism would require
it to bring its methods up to a well-thought-out standard agreed upon for all. There
are such standards in all the matters above mentioned, some of which are found exem-
plified at each school, but they are checked and often neutralized either by the bad
institutional habits of earlier years, or by the radical, undigested innovations intro-
duced on the spur of the moment thru the system of one-man control. It is unthinkable
that a modern corporation, doing in each of five Missouri towns a business requiring
from five hundred to one thousand employees in each plant, would tolerate the mean-
ingless and arbitrary variety in methods directed at identical ends that presents itself
THE PRESENT SYSTEM 51
in these five normal schools. Some years ago, to terminate the existing chaos, the
state inaugurated in each school a standard system of financial accounting and stopped
there. Meanwhile, the vastly more important interest, that for which the schools exist
and for which they should be held most strictly to account, namely, their educational
procedure, goes without scrutiny, check, or control of any sort save by the one man
whose apparent success and public recognition have no relation, direct or indirect, to
the proved excellence of his work. In the name of "liberty" the real emphasis is placed
on "difference;" whereas in all other processes, the effective procedure is first to agree
on the best way the thing is to be done, and then put the emphasis squarely on the
quality of the work. Under the present system of local boards such cooperation is
impracticable.
THE NOEMAL SCHOOLS versus THE STATE UNIVERSITY
The absence of material and educational coordination of the normal schools among
themselves is thus a serious and expensive defect. These same disadvantages are ac-
centuated, however, in the active friction and lack of adjustment between the five
normal schools on the one hand and the state university on the other. The normal
schools, altho virtually identical in scope, are relatively non-competitive by reason
of their districting. The state's one great centre of higher education, on the other
hand, almost from its inception, has exercised the function of preparing teachers — for
years many elementary, of late mostly high school teachers and administrative officers.
Between these two institutional groups competition is inevitable unless forestalled
either by an adequate controlling organization or by voluntary coordination on the
part of the responsible educational leaders. The former does not exist; the latter failed
up to 1916. Even under the entente then arranged it exists only in minor tho impor-
tant respects; in all matters affecting the field or scope of operations the traditional
autonomy prevails. In the cases of at least two normal schools this autonomy means
frank competition with the university — competition first in filling positions in high
schools, and second in securing the attendance of students for a four-year college
course. Offering as they have elaborate elective programs of a general character, the
schools at both Kirksville and Cape Girardeau must naturally exert themselves to fill
the high school vacancies in their respective districts to the exclusion of students from
the university, and can hardly see without regret the attendance at the university of
students who might be taking college work with them. The school at Warrensburg,
altho it has prepared a larger number of high school teachers than either of the other
two, has not so clearly assumed this attitude; while Springfield and Maryville have
until recently devoted themselves to the supply of elementary teachers. With due
growth in size or a slight shift in personal relations, however, there is no reason to
expect that these schools also will not aggressively press their claims to the high school
positions within their districts.
52 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
SOURCES OF RIVALRY
This competition is the logical outcome of the historical development traced else-
where.1 The university, preparing the teachers for the largest and strongest high
schools and standardizing the conditions surrounding them, has projected its influ-
ence steadily deeper; the normal school, training the teachers in the smaller high
schools, has as steadily strengthened its courses for this purpose as small high schools
have multiplied, and its influence has mounted with their growth. At last the two
forces have met, and the problem of their mutual adjustment is as yet unsolved.2
One of the university's most effective aids in developing its tributary high schools
has been its high school inspector. For the admission of its graduates to the univer-
sity without examination, the approved high school has been obliged to satisfy a con-
stantly increasing list of requirements in all points aifecting its efficiency, including
the training of its teachers. This has been an incalculable benefit to every high school
community — a benefit difficult of attainment byany other method : yet the operations
of this inspector easily become the object of suspicion by the normal schools that are
desirous of placing their graduates in positions that he inspects. Where there is strong
difference of opinion as to what constitutes -satisfactory training, such as has long
existed between the university and some of the normal schools, serious conflict may
and does arise out of a perfectly sincere attitude on both sides. To represent their
special interests the normal schools have had recourse to a "field agent," either to
serve expressly as a drummer for students and positions, or to unite that function
with certain more dignified extension duties. One of these officers professes to know
intuitively which youth belongs in the university and which in the normal school,
and to act accordingly, but promoters cannot always be counted upon to decide
infallibly in such matters. Aside from these official representatives, the instructors
and officers in all institutions acting as lecturers, commencement speakers, and so
forth, conduct an indirect and, in itself, doubtless wholesome propaganda; but to
have these educational servants of the state working at cross purposes in pressing
the claims of one institution rather than another — both state supported — is bewil-
dering and unfair to the student as well as wasteful to the state and hurtful to its
real educational interests.
With one notable exception the official literature of the six institutions appears
to have been restrained and considerate in tone. The publications of the school at
Kirksville, altho intended for the use of students, have been consistently devoted to
partisan efforts. The alleged virtues and achievements of this particular school have
been glowingly set forth, with attacks and reflections both direct and indirect upon
another state institution. Competition for high school students and positions is con-
ceived to be the normal condition : "If the universities should gain control of the high
schools, then the so-called small colleges, the normal schools, and the various inde-
1 See pages 85-87.
a See pages 89-98.
THE PRESENT SYSTEM 53
pendent technical schools would cease to have the means of competition, and the uni-
versities would be all-powerful."1
It might reasonably be expected that sincere efforts for educational readjustment
would be taken to the proper agency, the legislature, without seeking to prejudice stu-
dents by polemics against a sister school. Such competitive exploitation should be
impossible, and would be were all institutions subject to review and coordination by
a single authority.
EFFECTS OF INSTITUTIONAL COMPETITION
Outside of the institutions themselves, educational and other interests in the state
at large are influenced to no slight extent by sympathy with one party or the other.
Certain towns are practically closed to one school or another because of a superin-
tendent drawn from an opposing institution; influential school board members, biased
by trivial personal attachments — a child who has attended, a good speech, or a favor
done by a representative — direct the patronage regardless of the merits of the appli-
cants. The state superintendent of public schools, an officer who should make effective
disposal of all the educational energies in the state, necessarily becomes more or less
partisan. If, as in several recent cases, he be a man without college or university train-
ing, he feels himself largely out of sympathy with these higher institutions ; if, on the
-other hand, he be a university man without normal school experience, he and his office
are likely to be distrusted by the institutions with which he has most to do. Theo-
retically he is a Republican or a Democrat ; actually he is pro-university or pro-normal
school, or so considered; to control the superintendency is therefore worth the effort
of both sides.
Under present conditions it is to the interest of each and every institution to push
its claims before the legislature; this results in the maintenance of a sort of legisla-
tive lobby. It is not a long step from the legitimate presentation of the needs of an
institution to the "log rolling" that bases success on efforts of quite another nature,
and it is declared by competent observers that the tendency to take this step is al-
ready strong in Missouri. To what extent this is true it is difficult to say, but with
two sets of institutions sharply and increasingly competitive in an important field,
there is the prospect that, as in some other states, the people and their representa-
tives will gradually segregate into "pro-university" and "pro-normal school" groups,
and that other legislation will be affected or determined by this division.
THE LOCAL BOAEB SYSTEM RESPONSIBLE
It is hardly necessary to point out that the conditions and tendencies noted above
are unwholesome, and that they are plainly traceable to the present system of inde-
pendent local boards. To sum up the defects of these boards it may be said: (1) that
in practice, if not in theory, they may, and frequently do, change too rapidly; (2) that
1 Bulletin (Supplementary), KvrJcsville, September, 1907, page 1.
54 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
owing to Ignorance of their true duties their members almost inevitably interfere, to
the injury of the institutions, in matters that the state has assigned to its paid ex-
perts ; (3) that where their members do not thus interfere, their duties are so nominal
as not to interest men of the highest ability and public standing; (4) that for political
considerations they are capable of disregarding their educational obligations; (5) that
lacking a competent and convincing educational adviser who has the good of the
whole state in view, they may easily ignore the local head of an institution and make
serious mistakes, or yet more easily be induced by an enthusiastic president to follow
a course that is either futile or detrimental to the state as a whole; (6) that the system
breaks down completely when it is desired to coordinate the work of several institu-
tions according to one consistent policy. This is shown in irrational appropriations, in
pointless and wasteful divergences in practice, in the intx*oduction, by irresponsible
officers, of arbitrary innovations directly affecting other schools, and in the destruc-
tive rivalry that wastes both funds and energy, bewilders the student, breeds friction
among public schools and their officers, and injects wholly unnecessary partisanship
into legislative discussion. In short, under such conditions, education becomes not a
matter of statesmanship but of politics.
On the other hand, the best that can be said in defence of the local boards is in-
conclusive. It is urged that by this system more men are kept actively interested in
the schools than the few who might constitute the central authority in some other
plan. This is not necessarily true, for local committees, made up of women as well as
men, could be designated for the advisory inspection and genuine promotion of the
school in the community without investing them with power to maintain an irritat-
ing and useless interference or allowing them by their very existence to block the
realization of a sound policy for the whole state. Beyond!" this there is1 little to urge.
Poor as the system is in general, and bad as it is in some particular spots, the main
fault lies in its weakness. When established it was regarded by the best contempo-
rary opinion as much less effective than the centralized system that it displaced,
and the experience of forty years and of other states has amply borne out the earlier
judgment.
B. PROPOSALS FOR A BETTER ORGANIZATION OF PROFESSIONAL TRAINING FOR TEACHERS
How can Missouri most profitably administer the preparation of her teachers ?
This is an important and difficult question : important because there is much at
stake; difficult because changed conditions everywhere demand a fresh answer for
which no American state has as yet worked out a wholly satisfactory precedent. From
a material, social, and intellectual standpoint, Missouri has been transformed in fifty
years; her needs to-day are radically different from those that dominated her reorgan-
ization after the Civil War. Her possibilities are measured, furthermore, not merely
by the best that any other commonwealth possesses, but by the degree of skill with
PROPOSALS FOR BETTER ORGANIZATION 55
which the lessons learned elsewhere can be turned to account. A state should by all
means move cautiously and surely in new educational adjustments; but every pro-
gressive community must expect sometimes to lead the way in making trial of promis-
ing means of advancement.
PREPARATION OF TEACHERS A HOMOGENEOUS UNDERTAKING
A completely serviceable administration of the preparation of teachers in Missouri
probably cannot be attained without reorganization. We have seen how the existing
institutions were set up independently. Proceeding from small, tho for the time ade-
quate beginnings, they have grown with the people's growth, and now hamper one
another by their unrelated efforts. The present need is to coordinate and blend them
into a single, powerful, and smoothly working instrument for the great service that
they are expected to perform. Leaving the two great cities out of account, it may be
said that, at present, the state is preparing its teachers thru seven unrelated, tax-sup-
ported agencies. The university, under a board of curators, has prepared or shared
the preparation of many instructors for the strongest and largest high schools. The
five normal schools, under their several local boards, have prepared or shared the pre-
paration of about half of the high school teachers, especially for the small schools,
and two-thirds of the elementary teachers in graded schools; they have also exerted
more or less influence over nearly half of the vast mass of rural school teachers. The
high school training classes, under the control of the state superintendent, are sup-
posed to prepare exclusively for the rural schools, but have not been carefully regu-
lated for that purpose. There can be no reasonable question that better results than
are now accomplished under these several managements could be secured under one
control. To educate teachers for the public schools is essentially one homogeneous
task, and in communities as great and as closely knit as a modern state like Missouri,
this function could profitably be unified in expert hands.
A REORGANIZED UNIVERSITY
The main question is, of course, the relation between such a unified system and
the present institutions. In Missouri the answer to this question is greatly facilitated
by the nature of the situation. The five normal schools are similar institutions of
like aims and traditions, and are well distributed over the state. They are at pres-
ent offering a great variety of elective curricula, but all include the four-year cur-
riculum parallel with the regular four-year curriculum at the university; none has at-
tempted to give graduate courses. In spite of the considerable amount of secondary
work now required of them, it is obvious that in the broadest sense these professional
training schools, hitherto by accident described as "normal schools," are already, in
spirit and purpose, essentially a part of that equipment for higher and professional
education that constitutes a university, whether so organized or not. There are ex-
cellent reasons why it would be wise to recognize and confirm this fact by incorpo-
56 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
rating the present normal schools together with the university school of education as
a state Division of Education fully organized and equipped to provide for all phases
of the professional training of teachers for the public schools of the state. The normal
schools would thus become State Colleges of Education within the university and
subject to the same consideration as any other branches of that institution.
- Longer to maintain the distinction between the university and the normal school
as representing a distinguishable difference in grade or quality of instruction is, in
the cases of the best normal schools in this country, purely factitious; and its eradi-
cation would be the best possible reason for requiring of inferior schools a genuine
enforcement of the standards to which most of them now profess their adherence. In
the numerous American normal schools now doing thoroughly standard work, the
instructors have as broad and as intensive training as those giving instruction to stu-
dents of equal advancement in good colleges and universities, and are quite frequently
superior in this respect. In the content of instruction the normal school provides
a specialized professional organization of material that in its field is as significant
technically as any work in medicine or law. The teaching in first class normal schools
is probably in advance of that to be found in the ordinary arts colleges or even in
the better medical and law schools. Both institutions use the same tools — books,
both for text and reference, laboratories, and collections — frequently making them
for each other ; both seek the same scientific standards of achievement ; both con-
duct original enquiries and "surveys," tho in the university this latter purpose neces-
sarily stands forth more clearly. Furthermore, the interchange of personnel is con-
stant: students in large numbers proceed from the normal schools to the universities,
not for different, but primarily for more advanced work than the former are able
to offer; on the other hand, students from the universities, or those who have had
both types of training, return to the normal school as instructors, bringing the ways
and ideals of the university with them. For twenty years the two institutions have
been more and more acutely conscious of each other as they have moved in con veiling
lines to the same goal : the normal school proving to the university the vitality and effi-
cacy of a central professional purpose in preparing teachers, the university serving the
normal school as a steady and beneficent critic while profiting by its progress. The nor-
mal schools represent the only type of higher professional education not yet formally
included in the university group. Fusion of the two in one organization is reasonable,
and would manifestly promote the fundamental integrity of the state's educational life.
A PROFESSIONAL BOARD OF EXECUTIVES
The plan suggested would at once make it possible to consolidate all of the state's
teacher- training agencies under one educational direction, as well as under a single
formal government. With this in view the affairs of these five colleges, together with
the university school of education, should be placed under the direction of a new
board consisting of the heads of these six units, with whom should sit also the presi-
PROPOSALS FOR BETTER ORGANIZATION 57
dent or chancellor of the university and the state superintendent of public schools.
This board would constitute not merely the responsible authority for the manage-
ment of certain institutions. It would be a board of expert men in complete charge
of the preparation and supply of all teachers for the state, and the regulation of such
lateral interests as the high school training classes in their professional aspects should
be under its control. Its decisions would be reported to the board of curators of the-
university for approval, and might of course be vetoed by it. Such action, however,
would certainly be rare; the habit of a competent group would be to study a mea-
sure with such thoroughness as to admit of but one conclusion before seeking final
approval thereon.
A board for the purposes here indicated should be ensured the power, the i-espon-
sibility, and the necessary procedure for reaching reliable results. It should nominate
the personnel of instruction and administration, including the presidents and dean,
in the component colleges and school of education. It should propose policies and
regulations for administrative action. With the assistance of the state department
of education it should study unremittingly the dimensions and character of its prob-
lem in the number and kind of teachers needed in the state. In cooperation with the
several faculties, and with their approval, it should work out and revise curricula to
meet these needs. It should consider and propose the creation or adaptation of material
facilities with the single purpose of solving in the best possible fashion for the state
the problem of teacher supply. The expert character of its members, and their relief
from local and political demands, their opportunities for securing abundant accu-
rate information, the elimination of competition, and the requirement of frequent
(at least monthly) sessions for careful discussion and planning would go far toward
an assurance that the ultimate solution of their problem would be correct.
EFFECTS OF PROPOSED REORGANIZATION
The form of organization here described has certain suggestive implications:
(I) The heads of the several institutions, cooperating as executives of their respec-
tive colleges under the new plan, instead of being semi-political promoters with at-
tention divided between the local board and the legislature, would become strictly
educational officers concerned solely with their individual institutions as carrying out
a definite state policy framed by them and for which they were responsible. Their ten-
ure would be permanent and secure instead of biennial and precarious as now; their
power in the state would be greater and their judgment surer because of constant
mutual criticism and support; the position would be attractive to trained students
of education and to men of first-rate ability.
(&) The teachers in the present normal schools would at once acquire 'fall collegiate
or university status; salaries, hours of work, and pension privileges, as well as quali-
fications of training and experience, would be regulated for aH alike; there would be
but one fraternity of state-employed servants in higher education. The students like-
58 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
wise would be relieved of invidious distinctions, both actual and alleged, between
themselves and regular college or university students. In the interests of solidarity
in higher education the university could well afford to welcome the alumni of the nor-
mal schools to such standing as their varying attainments might justify,
(3) Administrative differences would immediately disappear in favor of one thor-
oughly studied procedure worked out and applied in joint consultation. Admissions
could be handled from one central office, possibly that of the state superintendent,
thus securing a just and uniform treatment of credentials. A common terminology, a
uniform grading and credit system, would convince both teacher and pupil that he
was not a victim of local idiosyncrasy, but had received standard treatment, open to
objection possibly on its merits but applied to all alike.
(4) The curricula would be unified and harmonized, and their administration placed
on a rational basis. Since all schools and teachers would be of equal standing* it would
make no more difference whether a certain curriculum for kindergartners or for high
school teachers were given at one college or another, than it would if they were given
in different buildings on the same campus. Such matters would be determined on the
merits of local need and availability in view of all considerations and without insti-
tutional prejudice or jealousy. A large financial saving would certainly accrue at this
point. Great advantage for the curriculum would result, too, from the increased flexi-
bility of the staff of instruction. With intimate association of all colleges in the uni-
versity, instructors could readily be assigned from one to another for special courses or
lectures, thus utilizing fully each teacher's best powers. Teachers in other departments
of the university would be available for the same purpose. Again, with associated ad-
ministration, the school of education, which would doubtless develop primarily as a
research or graduate school, would be in an admirable, in fact the only logical posi-
tion to assist and be aided by the various enquiries undertaken at the five collegiate
centres. Instructors in the colleges would then be in close and continual contact with
this work of the graduate school, where they could perfect their training or cooperate
on special problems.
(5) Outside of the institutions, the chief effect of the proposed plan would be to
relieve the state of the element that most disturbs and confuses its representatives
in providing for higher education. At present each separate school demands all that
it dares, in the hope of finally obtaining enough to allow it to operate and expand.
Budgets are made out not on educational grounds, but with an eye to institutional
success, and the arbiter as to what these various interests — some genuine, some fanci-
ful, some real but inflated — shall receive, is a legislative committee of laymen wholly
uninformed except by the glowing advice of the interested local board members and
presidents.1 By the proposed plan the budget for the training of teachers would be
fully worked out jointly in the board of presidents; the chancellor and the board of
1 A representative of the enquiry was present at one visit of the state junketing committee. Surrounded by mem-
bers of the local board of regents and by school officers, these gentlemen went thru buildings and grounds, made
speeches at the student assembly, and were very uneconomically entertained by the home economics department
PROPOSALS FOR BETTER ORGANIZATION 59
curators would be responsible for its suitable incorporation in the budget of the uni-
versity, and the proposals for financing the state's higher education would come as
a logical whole before the state's government. With its support merged thus in the
general budget, the normal school would find immediate relief from the pressure for
numbers that now exercises such a baneful influence over its educational policies. Ap-
propriations could be unspecified as to their detailed application, which would be
subject to the discretion of the board of executives. It would be possible, for example,!
by economies in other quarters, for a central control to relieve the pressure of num-
bers at Springfield even on a reduced total appropriation. Such an administration
would convince the state that within the general scope of its desires, its funds were
being wisely distributed by those who were engaged "because they knew best how to
do it,
(6) To the state at large the benefit of having a single unified scheme of higher
education would be manifold. The student fresh from high school and anxious about
his future would receive consistent and unbiased advice at any institution and in all
of the state's official educational literature, as to where he could best go for what he
needed. Instead of being lured by personal and printed eulogies to help swell the roll
of this or that school, he would be told candidly what each school was equipped to
give him, and would be urged to get the best either within or without the state. Each.
school would be a stronger institution. When confronted with the alternatives, the
people of Missouri prefer teachers prepared by institutions that ensure nationally
recognized standards of excellence to schools that may be swayed this way and that
by local pressure, and that remain provincial because they lack the detached point
of view that enables them to lead their communities. Furthermore, the popular effect
of an orderly, harmonious scheme of education is superior to that resulting from in-
stitutional strife. Missouri has already seen partisans 6f the university and partisans
of the normal schools lined up in opposition on questions that were not issues between
the schools. This tendency is likely to increase as the normal schools grow into more
and more effective rivals of the university, until wholly irrelevant decisions will be
reached according as the "university vote" or the "normal school vote" can be more
effectively marshaled. This outcome ought to be avoided.
(7) It is worth noting, finally, that an organization in Missouri of the nature above
described, if carried thru fully and in good faith, would mark a new epoch in Amer-
ican institutional life in this field. It would serve to seal the fast-closing breach
between two groups of institutions that have stood aloof in feud-like attitude for
many years. Not all states, to be sure, are in a position to bring about such a change.
States in which the normal schools are, and must long remain^ chiefly secondary in-
stitutions would scarcely come within the scope of this plan. States having no state
university would be confined to organizing their training agencies in a single pro-
cm which the schools lean heavily in such events. An agreeable understanding with the legislature was no doubt
promoted, but as a means for determining the character of the school and its operations with a view to support, the
occasion is, of course, quite absurd.
60 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
fessional group. But where there exist side by side a state university and one or more
professional institutions of collegiate grade, all devoted to the same purpose, there
would seem to be little question of the wisdom of incorporating all units that are
functionally similar into one organic whole in so far as their direction and control are
concerned*
The one "insuperable" objection to the proposal that has been made by normal
school men is that "the university would swallow up the normal schools ;" on the other
hand, the friends of the university regard the plan as impracticable because "the nor-
mal schools would swallow up the university." To an outside observer it would appear
to be much to the advantage of the state were this mutual repast to take place as soon
as possible; whatever may result from the process should then devote its undistracted
attention to giving Missouri an adequate supply of first class teachers. One normal
school head agreed that the plan was excellent, but thought it could not be carried
out without a completely new set of normal school presidents. If the plan is excellent
and if this opinion is true, comment is unnecessary.
THE CITY TRAINING SCHOOLS SHOULD BE INCLUDED
It has been a question up to this point of establishing a vigorous unity of movement
and purpose for the six state institutions — the five normal schools and the univer-
sity. The reorganization should not stop there. Missouri is peculiar in that a pre-
dominantly rural population is sealed up behind two great municipal gateways of
national importance. Between these cities and the state the interests and obligations
are mutual; they are parts one of another, and every important policy of either should
aim to recognize and intensify rather than weaken this solidarity.
In the work of education the one feature that may properly assume paramount im-
portance in thus binding city and country together, the one responsibility which the
state should reserve consistently and universally to herself, is the teacher. Local ex-
penditure for supplies and equipment may vary within limits, but the animating
spirit of the state's educational system, be it rural, or municipal, or metropolitan,
should be one and the same. Practically considered, it is a somewhat remote ideal that
the district school teacher in an obscure village should possess the same training as
the teacher in the well-developed schools at St. Louis. Nevertheless, that is the ideal
of American democratic education, and the avenue to its ultimate attainment is plain
enough : Generous state expenditures for better teaching, and state control of all state
moneys so expended. While the state has been slowly building up its conviction in
favor of a policy of normal school support, St. Louis was compelled to embark alone
upon her- own program of intensive training. Now, however, the state is fully com-
mitted; she desires the best possible training for her teachers everywhere. And in the
reorganization of her facilities for this purpose, a reorganization that cannot be long
postponed, the support and control of ample training facilities for her cities should
be willingly assumed. There can be little question that in this respect the legislation
PROPOSALS FOR BETTER ORGANIZATION 61
of 1915 was a mistake. Here for the first time the state turned over to St. Louis and
to Kansas City considerable appropriations for local training of teachers, and aban-
doned all right of control and supervision as to how the money should be spent. The
inrooting of such a policy means the perpetuation of these two great centres as vir-
tual islands in the educational life of the state. In the commonwealth of ideas these
two cities propose henceforth increasingly to walk apart and therefore aloof from the
state at large. This would be a misfortune, and the way to avoid it is for the state to
guarantee on its own account teachers that shall be completely satisfactory to the
cities. The claim of the cities is just — the state owes them funds for this purpose;
but with these funds to allow the cities to wall themselves off intellectually is utterly
indefensible, and to train up for themselves alone a closed and locally privileged
class of teachers has just this effect.
If the State of Missouri were to own and control as part of her training system a
first class four-year college for teachers in St. Louis, drawing students chiefly from
St. Louis, but accessible on equal terms from the state at large, and sending gradu-
ates both to city and town, the immediate reaction throughout the other state schools
would alone be worth the cost. On the other hand, there is no reason why such a school,
operating in close sympathy with the local school authorities, should not be fully as
effective as the present institution controlled wholly by the city. As a constituent unit
in a Division of Education of the state university, suggested above, such a school
would virtually set the pace, and would constantly and powerfully influence educa-
tion all over the state. It is true, of course, that on the part of the city a certain
intimate sense of proprietorship in its local training agency would be missed. This
would be more than offset, however, by the soundness of a situation that conceives
the people of the state to be essentially one, and that, while providing effectively for
local demands, holds each part responsible for promoting the general movement for-
ward. For these reasons a state-supported college in St. Louis, and possibly another
in Kansas City, should be included in the proposed university system, having their
directors members of the board of administration and coordinate with the heads of
the other state colleges of education.
VoLUNTAEY CoOPEEATION
Pending a complete readjustment of relations, an existing movement toward volun-
tary cooperation demands more than passing attention. The story of earlier attempts
on the part of the state normal schools to act in unison has already been told.1 The
lack of any real inducement for these combinations, aside from personal sanction,
seems to have brought them successively to naught. Since the inauguration of the
present study, however, a plan of cooperation has been worked out that includes a new
factor, the university, and embraces two features that contribute elements of possible
permanence. First, the plan contemplates exchange of credit between all state insti-
1 See page 44.
62 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
tutlons which satisfy certain fully defined standards. This relation with the university
is new, and will undoubtedly add force and incentive to the arrangement. The other
significant feature of the plan is a committee of visitation and inspection selected an-
nually, one member appointed from the state department to be chairman ; a second,
selected by the faculty of the university, and a third, by the faculty of a normal school
— the last representing the schools in rotation. It should be noted that these last two
members represent not the presidents but the faculties of the respective institutions.
The duty of the committee is to report on each institution's adherence to the pro-
posed standards, presumably after sufficient investigation. The standards set forth in
the agreement deal with terms of admission, advanced standing, records, and credit ;
the preparation and teaching load of instructors; program hours, certificates, and
degrees of students ; and terminology of courses.
This agreement among the schools is thoroughly admirable as far as it goes. There
is danger lest the committee prove either too inquisitive to commend itself to all of
the institutions, or too tender hearted to accomplish its purpose; with tact and judg-
ment it should be able to smooth out differences and pave the way for, mutual con-
fidence in so far as this depends upon correct administration in such details. It would
be a pity, however, if the real significance of the movement did not go beyond this.
The responsible heads of the state's training schools have here united in a permanent
conference group to have definite and frequent meetings, where matters of importance
will be discussed. Their union has been voluntary and uninfluenced by any outside dic-
tation. There is an excellent opportunity, under such circumstances, for officials more
interested in the state than in their respective personal fortunes to proceed from
minor matters to the real problems that confront them : the actual demand for their
product, the scope and possible differentiation of their respective efforts, the quality
and value of their curricula, and so forth. Thru the development of this conference
group the state might evolve a board of expert leaders in this all-important function
— a permanent "general staff" committed to persistent discussion and sifting of these
larger problems until the fight solution should be found. In that case no institution
would feel justified in taking an important step without the approval of this group ;
and the education of the state's most important professional class would be conducted
with harmony and clear purpose on a high level. In such an event Missouri would
establish a most notable precedent -for cooperation. The success of the movement
would, of course, be immensely facilitated by bringing all the normal schools legally
into the organization of the university — a step that could be taken by statute with-
out disturbing the impregnable rock of the Missouri constitution; but much can be
done even without this very desirable change, as the unanimous verdict of such a
body of educational leaders would probably carry great weight with any local author-,
ity. There is every reason why the state, unless prepared for radical action, should
allow the new movement time in which to bear its full fruit, in the hope that this
possible larger outcome may be realized.
REORGANIZATION OF STATE CONTROL 63
C. REORGANIZATION OF STATE EDUCATIONAL CONTROL
The merits of various types of state administration in educational affairs are not
the main subject of this study. A well-conducted state department is, nevertheless, of
such capital importance to a successful management of teacher preparation and sup-
ply that a brief consideration cannot well be avoided.
PRINCIPLE OF CENTRALIZATION
Whatever steps may be taken in Missouri or elsewhere in the name of progress in
educational organization, it is safe to say that they will represent in some form the
present inevitable tendency toward simplification, by centralizing power and respon-
sibility in the hands of a few individuals — and these fitted to use it. Most of the not-
able gains in educational administration during the past quarter century have been
of this nature. They have come first in cities where the problem could be grasped by
one brain and the treatment be worked out at one desk. Gradually the principle
has been applied to counties and larger districts, where wiser selection of officers, bet-
ter compensation, and larger powers will yet work vast improvement. The natural
climax of the development has been reached in the movement to galvanize into use-
ful action the more or less quiescent or perfunctory state departments of education.
It is with these that we are particularly concerned.
THE STATE UNIT OF ADMINISTRATION
In the American Union the state, except for special, purposes, is the largest admin-
istrative unit in educational affairs. As our commonwealths have become more and
more self-conscious in laboring for the permanent protection and satisfaction of their
people, the problem of education has assumed constantly increasing importance. The
only successful plan hitherto discovered has been to obtain the services of the best
trained minds available, regardless of cost, and about these leaders to build an or-
ganimtion with adequate powers. Thru this means the state hopes first to study and
understand itself, and to have its needs translated into educational terms that may
be embodied in suitable legislation. It aims, further, to gather and prepare the most
profitable educational information for the benefit of all in the state who may need it.
Most important of all, it aims thru this authority to make and enforce standards
wherewith to express for the state as a whole the educational will and ideals that it
could not realize in the isolated efforts of its parts. As the economy and profit of
state regulation has become apparent, its scope has steadily enlarged: it affects in
varying ways school buildings, equipment, and finances; attendance and curricula;
the health of pupils and the duties of school directors. But the greatest and by far
the most important feature of its extension has been its jurisdiction over qualifica-
tions of the personnel engaged in instruction^ and supervision, reaching sometimes
even to the selection and pay of important local officers.
64 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
ADVANTAGES OF STATE CONTROL
This concern on the part of the state for the selection, training, and control of
the teacher and school officer is the sanest development of modern school adminis-
tration. A state making good use of its powers in this direction could probably af-
ford to ignore most other elements in public education without losing its place in
advance of its less far-sighted neighbors. For whatever the mechanical and material
progress in an educational organism, — and this has been enormous in America dur-
ing recent years, — the clearest lesson of our growth is that the real level of a school
system is exactly measured by the character, ability, and well-being of its teaching
and supervising body. Where these elements have been left to local initiative, pro-
gress has been fitful and uneven, with sharp and demoralizing contrasts; but where
the state, representing the major ideals of the people, has boldly asserted its pre-
rogative, and has shaped its teaching staff into a corps of trained public servants,
officers of the state instead of local employees, the response from the community has
been immediate, and the effect on the teachers has invariably been to give them
dignity, stability, and strength. The obstacles encountered are chiefly those of unre-
flecting tradition : a public temper that resists high personal qualifications because it
habitually thinks of public service in terms of opportunity for livelihood at public
expense rather than as an obligation for the public welfare ; a tendency in institutions
to prefer expansion by catering to the anticipated future of the institution itself rather
than by a direct attack on a problem that may involve a degree of sincere self-efface-
ment; and lastly — the root trouble with the whole lay opposition — the inability to
comprehend that a select and highly efficient body of teachers is well worth the rela-
tively greater money cost. These attitudes are more or less prevalent in all states, and
yield only to unremitting educational effort
CONDITIONS OF SUCCESSFUL STATE ADMINISTRATION
To work its will successfully, experience has shown that a state must have a central
educational authority possessing well-trained intelligence in technical affairs, coupled
with full power and responsibility in its field, both completely shielded from political
influences. When the state has indicated the general direction of its educational de-
sires and policy, the more liberty that can be allowed its officers in working these out,
the better, as they involve a multitude of details impossible of legislative regulation
without destructive results. Particularly in the **pro visions governing teachers'* qual-
ifications and service the way should be left clear for free initiative and correction.
Statutes on matters of such fluid detail serve no purpose save to bind the schools to
the past and to set commissioners the useless task of accomplishing a necessary end in
some roundabout way. Steady administrative change in matters of this nature, annual
if need be, as the result of a systematic study of the total situation, is the rational
method of progress as compared with a set of rigid laws followed by a long-agitated
change to another set destined to become equally rigid.
REORGANIZATION OF STATE CONTROL 65
Of all the phases of the teacher problem with which a state authority should be
equipped to deal, that of preparation and supply is the most important. At this point
the state's educational arm should be steady and powerful. Of what use is it to study
the needs of the schools and to gather wisdom from outside experience if one is help-
less to enforce reasonable standards of qualification? With no control over the agen-
cies for training teachers, the central office is at the mercy of fluctuating conditions.
Confronted with a very pressing and specific need, it is compelled to wait upon the
independent heads of institutions whose purposes may be in no way identical with its
own, and whose knowledge of the situation is bound to be far less complete. Teacher
supply, instead of being a rational problem with known quantities, becomes as uncer-
tain as a lottery. To secure the necessary results, professional training for teaching,
when conducted by the state, must cease to be vague and fortuitous, as is much of our
higher education, and must be subordinated to intelligent forces that are studying and
guiding the state's educational interests as a whole. For this purpose, therefore, the
direction of such work, whatever form it may take, should be placed under one har-
monious control capable of building up a consistent structure to serve the state that
creates it.
UNIFICATION OF CONTROL IN MISSOURI
Ho wean an organization on these principles be brought about in Missouri? The best
educational opinion will concur in the conclusion that the present system of local nor-
mal school boards is a disadvantage and should be abandoned. The foregoing section
was devoted to a plan whereby these schools should be given their natural place in the
university organization, with their executives in charge of the whole problem of the
preparation and supply of teachers for the state. Informed opinion will likewise agree
that it is a serious weakness to have a state superintendent elected by the people as a
partisan, and that he should be replaced by a skilled officer, chosen solely for his abil-
ity, on a tenure of "good behaviour," and responsible to a group of intelligent laymen.
The absolute need for concerted action between these two authorities — the one
responsible for training in state institutions, the other for administration at large —
suggests at once the advisability of placing both functions under one board of rep-
resentative citizens who shall harmonize their joint operations and ensure that all of
the educational interests that are supported by the state be developed in a wise and
mutually helpful manner. Such a step would be unprecedented in the management
of state educational affairs in America. It is, however, the logical outcome of a power-
ful impulse toward unity that for years has been actuating the experiments in edu-
cational administration all over this country.
EXPERIMENTS IN OTHER STATES
In certain states, such as Massachusetts, Wisconsin, and, most recently, Illinois, im-
provement in administration has taken the simple form of bringing several normal
66 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
schools under the control of one board for the sake of economy. Only in Massachusetts
has this unification included the state department of education, which, by virtue of
its relation to the public schools of the state, has a predominant interest in the con-
duct of the normal schools. The board is served by an appointive Commissioner of
Education, who thus has it in his power to coordinate the service of the normal schools
with the needs of the state in admirable fashion. There being no state institutions for
higher education in Massachusetts except the normal schools and an agricultural col-
lege, the board is, with this exception, a single authority for educational control.
Another form of consolidation has sought to unify all institutions for higher edu-
cation under one management. Thus, Iowa provides an unpaid lay board of nine, with
three paid lay executives in addition, and places it in charge of all higher institutions.
This board has no competent educational adviser and executive such as a state com-
missioner presumably would be, but must depend upon the representations of the
several heads of institutions, officers who necessarily speak, or must appear to speak,
esc pctrte on all inter-institutioual questions. In the Iowa plan, too, while the board
controls the normal school, the state superintendent and his office, which should stand
in most intimate relation with the normal school, are wholly independent; in fact,
maintain an attitude of mild opposition to the board. In Kansas the same trio of insti-
tutions— a threefold normal school, an agricultural college, and a state university —
are administered by a paid lay board of three members, likewise without a trained
educational executive or adviser other than the heads of institutions. Here also the
state education department, which naturally has a fundamental interest in the train-
ing of teachers, is left wholly separate and distinct.
The underlying purpose in Iowa, Kansas, and other states that have initiated sim-
ilar schemes is to coordinate institutional activities in the interests of economy. To
do this they have effected a degree of unification under merely "business" auspices,
as it were, — a movement that has had some salutary effects, but the measures taken
thus far have dealt largely or solely with the material phases of their charges. It has
not been perceived that the critical problems involved are essentially educational, and
can be worked out only by men with thorough educational training, empowered to
act on slowly maturing policies with the intelligent cooperation of able colleagties,
and with continuous study of the conditions. These states are like Missouri in thinking
their duty done when they have established a modern accounting system for financial
expenditures, and in ignoring completely the need for competent leadership in that
for which the institutions exist. So persistent is this attitude that in Kansas the most
recent development (1917) has been the appointment of a paid "business manager,"
by law a Kansan, responsible to the board, and expected to handle the financial affairs
of all state institutions; meanwhile, the direction of the educational policies of such
institutions as are educational has reverted largely to the local authorities, where it
should remain as long as no competent educational executive is placed in control.
The single board plan has attained fuller stature in Montana, where a board of
REORGANIZATION OF STATE CONTROL 67
eleven members governs all the higher institutions of the state. This board sought
a trained man as its educational adviser and executive. So far as our present experi-
ence goes, the plan is sound. As in the other cases, however, there is an indepen-
dent, elective state superintendent for the administration of the elementary and sec-
ondary schools. This disadvantage is not overcome by making him a member of the
board; were he appointed by it and responsible to it, his relation would be logical
and strong.
LESSONS FROM RECENT EXPERIENCE
The best American experience points to the conclusion that a single board of from
five to seven members appointed or elected at large for long terms, unpaid, and repre-
senting high and varied ability, is the most successful form of educational control
yet devised for a democratic community. But it must be so constructed and equipped
that it will automatically obtain its educational advice from competent sources. These
sources of technical advice must not compete with one another, but must be so dis-
posed as habitually to find their point of view in the welfare of the state as a whole.
The heads of independent state institutions for higher education do compete with
one another, and from a point of view not usually chosen with regard to the welfare of
the state as a whole; such institutional interests should therefore be brought under
one supervision and be represented by a director or chancellor for the staters under-
takings in higher education, all of which should be more or less firmly organized into
what is called the university.
On the other hand, the so-called state department of education, if it discharges the
functions properly assigned to it, has a preponderant interest in the performance of
the higher educational institutions that prepare teachers. Its executive, if a skilled
appointive officer, as he should be, is virtually the chancellor of elementary and sec-
ondary schools — a position that beyond all question is potentially the most widely
influential within the range of a state's educational system. The primary concern of
such an officer is with the great body of teachers in service; he studies their conditions,
regulates their qualifications, eliminates the unfit, and inspires and improves the capa-
ble. The best practical reason for his existence is that the state may maintain an ade-
quate and fully competent supply of teachers in its schools. It is obvious that in order
effectively to perform such duties he must find the whole machinery for preparing
these teachers reasonably responsive to his desires and policies.
The conclusion is unavoidable that to bring these two great administrative cen-
tres of state education into constant touch with one another under the eyes of a
single group of men responsible to the public would be a long stride in the direc-
tion of an effective organization. The state's entire educational program would gain
greatly in consistency and force if laid out by one permanent, controlling body;
while the economy of power in the direct methods of a unified administration would
be incalculable.
68 GOVERNMENT AND CONTROL
RELATIONS OF CONSTITUENT DEPARTMENTS
The question will at once be raised as to the relations of the two executive de-
partments subordinated by this plan to the single board. On this important point
there is no actual experience available for guidance. Analogies from business enter-
prises would favor a single officer as the chief adviser and executive for all purposes,
and there is every indication that such an appointment will eventually prove to be
absolutely necessary. When Missouri is willing to spend not less than fifteen thou-
sand dollars a year for a thoroughly trained and tested man and provide him with
two or three deputies at ten thousand dollars each, she will inaugurate the organiza-
tion that will most surely give her educational interests their appropriate place and
meaning in the state's social economy. At the present time, however, such experts,
thoroughly familiar with the problems that lie thick throughout the whole range of
educational effort, would be hard to find at the price that Missouri is probably pre-
pared to pay. We have men who know higher education well, and others who under-
stand state administration in all of its phases. A single chief for both departments,
except with ample funds for a capable staff, would certainly mean the relegation of
close thought and careful planning in each field to inferior subordinates, while the
head became a free lance for general purposes. This would not be what is needed.
The alternative is a single lay board seeking advice, in the institutional field, from
the head of its whole establishment for higher education ; and in the administrative
field, from its commissioner who represents the investigative, regulative, and ad-
ministrative phases of public education as far as the elementary and secondary schools
are concerned. These two departments are as distinct as are the divisions of army
and navy in the national economy, and yet quite as interdependent. Their respective
heads, as Chancellor of the University and Commissioner of Education, should be
chosen with equal care and receive equal compensation. They should be non-voting
members of the board and participants in all of its deliberations. Cooperation should
be their first duty in planning recommendations to the board, and should be the first
requirement of the board in case of disagreement, even to the retirement of one
adviser or the other.
Such an arrangement, so safeguarded, might reasonably result in a more vigorous
and expert leadership of each department than would be possible, for the same ex-
penditure, under the one-man system. It would certainly lead to a more thorough study
and threshing over of joint problems than a single head could require of his less
skilful subordinates. Its tendency would apparently be away from a cheap bureaucracy
under spectacular leadership in favor of a better vitalized, working group in closer
touch with actual conditions.
To recapitulate : Missouri, were she to act on these proposals, would possess a re-
organized university which would include all the tax-supported agencies that are
concerned with higher instruction, unified completely in a single self-acting, self-criti-
cising organism, and represented by a single administrative head — the state's director
REORGANIZATION OF STATE CONTROL 69
of higher and professional instruction. "Within this organism the broad function of
preparing teachers for the public schools of the state would be entrusted to a small
group of specialists acting in unison and in immediate control of the several institu-
tions for accomplishing their purposes. Side by side with the university would appear
the staters large and ever increasing organization for supervising and regulating the
operation of its elementary and secondary schools, for administering its many aids
and funds, and for studying and reporting the educational health and needs in every
part of the commonwealth; this would be in charge of the same board, but subject
in turn to its own administrative head — the commissioner of education, an officer
ranking with his university colleague, equally fitted for his position, and receiving
an equal salary. The chief business of the board would be to keep the best obtainable
executives in these two positions, and to require them, in constant cooperation with
one another, to furnish reasonable evidence of successful service. Beyond that the
function of the board would be to uphold and protect its servants ; to interpret their
aims and measures to the state; and to promote among the people a generous con-
ception of public education.
V
PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
A. GENERAL FUNCTION
1. THE EXISTING CONCEPTION
"WHAT should a normal school be?" This is a question which, according to Joseph
Baldwin, the first president at Kirks ville, "only the angels can answer." Whatever the
accuracy of this verdict, it is possible at least to discover what the function of the
institution has been as worked out in practice in Missouri.
EARLY CONCEPTION OF THE FUNCTION OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
The question may be reduced to the following alternatives : the normal school shall
either provide a general education, making its professional features more or less inci-
dental, or it shall undertake to give an intensive professional training, exclusively for
teachers. Of these alternatives, Missouri at any time in her early normal school his-
tory would have emphatically asserted the latter. From the beginning, the movement
was in the hands of men who had unlimited faith in the professional idea. Its appeal
was founded on the prevailing low state of training among common school teachers,
and it was promoted by teachers, superintendents, and associations of these, who had
definitely in mind the elevation of the class as a whole. So in 1871 the State Teach-
ers Association at Chillicothe resolved "that the normal schools should be at the
head of our educational system; that the course should be purely professional; and
that all preparatory work should be done in the public schools and universities." * The
early curricula exhibit this predominant idea very clearly: it was never a question of
giving or of not giving the professional subjects, but always of how much academic
material would suffice to supplement the defective preparation with which most stu-
dents came equipped. All subjects were presented or reviewed from the standpoint
of their most effective presentation to a class, and the practical usages of instruction
received heavy emphasis. "No effort has been spared to make the institution exclu-
sively a school for teachers."2 "In arranging the course of instruction strict regard
has been paid to the requirements of the public schools of Missouri, and in carrying
out that course our constant aim has been to give such training as will best qualify
the graduate both intellectually and morally for effective work as a teacher." 3 These
statements from Warrensburg in 1878 and 1886 reveal the attitude of the other
schools as well. President Baldwin, at Kirksville, declared in 1872 that "every energy
is directed to preparing for the public schools of Missouri the largest number of good
teachers in the shortest time,"4 and in 1880 : the aim of the school is "to give culture
and learning, not for the benefit of the student, but that it may be used in the edu-
1 State Report, 1871, page 19. 2 Ibid., 1878, page 224.
8 Ibid., 1886, pa&e 108. * Ibid.* 1872, pa&e 166.
GENERAL FUNCTION 71
cation of the masses." 1 Especially instructive are the observations of State Superin-
tendent Monteith, who was in office when the schools were started:
" It is a pretty well-defined result of experience, too, that normal schools should
be quite elementary in respect to the subject matter and curriculum of study. In a
school system which embraces high schools and universities, there is not the slight-
est reason why the normal school should duplicate the instruction of these more
' advanced institutions. I am thoroughly convinced, in observing the mistakes of
other states, that the normal school is disappointing the object of its design
when it drifts away from the common schools of the country. With this object
steadily in view, our Board of Regents are endeavoring to adjust the two schools
already established to the special conditions and wants of the state. The higher
mathematics and dead languages, except within a certain eminently practical
limit, are to give way to a more generous attention to natural science, drawing,
and the perfecting of teachers in the best methods of conducting the common
branches of the common school." 2
Missouri normal schools, therefore, were founded to train teachers. To say "exclu-
sively" would be technically wrong, as certain readjustments were occasionally made
here and there ; for example, special classes in Greek were sometimes offered to accom-
modate a few who wished to go to the university, and certain individuals were occa-
sionally present who did not declare their intention to teach. But the clear and con-
sistent aim apparent under all circumstances was to provide teachers, actual or pro-
spective, with special skill for their duties, and in their reports to the legislature all
the schools were solicitous to show that the largest possible proportion of their stu-
dents were actually teaching in the state.
SUBSEQUENT VARIATIONS
This fixed purpose of the first thirty years has wavered in some schools during the
subsequent period. The three original institutions furnish an interesting contrast in
this respect. In 1909, under the caption "People's College,1' Kirks ville announced itself
as follows :
** The State Normal School, Kirksville, Mo., is attempting to do a great work for
the people of the state by giving studies reaching from the kindergarten through
the most advanced college courses. This wide range of work — meeting the de-
mands of all the people — is found in very few first class schools. While advanced
common school courses are given in this institution for the benefit of those who
are preparing to teach in the rural and ungraded schools, academic degrees are
conferred upon those who have completed the work offered by our best colleges.
This brings the school in close touch with the people by giving an elaborate edu-
cation to those who want to enter the professions, and a vocational education
for those who want to take practical business courses. It cannot be denied that
the Normal School comes nearer the people than other schools and may there-
fore be justly called the People's College."8
* State Report, 1880, page 159. * Ibid., 1872, page 37.
3 Bulletin (Supplement), MrTcsmlle, June, 1909, page 1.
72 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
This statement is followed by an extensive program of courses that are clearly not
intended for teachers — one-year curricula chiefly in farming and commerce. Nowhere
in this bulletin, furthermore,, is there a clear statement that the school is of a limited
professional character, or that a declaration of intention to teach is required. It holds
out rather an alluring vision of a sort of educational lunch counter where everything
"the people "wish may be had in portions suited to their convenience.
The "People's College''"' idea does not appear to have thrived; at any rate, nothing
more is heard of it, and the catalogue of the following year goes back plainly to the
original aim : " The Normal School is not a college for general culture. It is a voca-
tional institution of college rank. Under the law its students declare their intention
to teach in the public schools." The subsequent catalogues have shown a single, strong
professional purpose.
At Cape Girardeau an enlargement of scope was announced in the same year as at
Kirks ville. The catalogue of 1909 declares: "The Normal School has a larger mission
in Southeast Missouri than that of a state college for teachers. . . . The institution
must be to this section of the state their one great college. It is fully equipped to meet
the demands that are naturally made upon it. In its college courses; in its agricultural
courses; in its Manual Training School; in its domestic science and domestic art
courses; in its School of Music; in its business courses; and in its teachers' college
the people of Southeast Missouri will find the opportunity to educate themselves for
their life work."
Tho placing its teachers college last in the above list, the school elsewhere in the
catalogue clearly defines its legal teacher-training function as a portion of its activ-
ity. In the catalogue of 1910 its "Field of Service" is formally described as comprising
"A School for Teachers," a "Sub-collegiate" department, and "A State College," the
latter offering (since 1907) courses leading to the degree of A.B. and requiring in them
no work in education whatever. Here we have, therefore, an institution deliberately
revising its organization throughout and introducing, not one-year vocational courses
as at Kirksville, but an elaborate curriculum with a new and alien purpose. It is diffi-
cult to see how either school could reconcile these departures with the law^s demand
for an exaction from each student of a declaration of intention to teach in the schools
of Missouri. Cape Girardeau, and possibly Kirksville, has been saved from embarrass-
ment thru the fact that but for a single case no graduate has taken the courses ex-
cept prospective teachers who could also avow their intention to teach; that, how-
ever, scarcely justifies the appeal for students distinctly excluded by law. This divided
purpose at Cape Girardeau has never been abandoned. On the contrary, it has been
officially reaffirmed in the school's magazine publications of 1913 and 1914,1 where
the pledge to teach is declared to be out of date, and it is frankly proposed to adapt
the institution to the needs of men and women who will teach but a short time, if at
all, and whose professional interest is therefore incidental at best.
1 The Educational Outlook, October, 1913, page 136.
GENERAL FUNCTION 73
Warrensburg, on the other hand, has consistently adhered to the original plan, to
the extent, at least, of an unequivocal announcement of her special aim in every cata-
logue down to the present year. An expression in the school's biennial report of 1885
is a fair sample of the early attitude : " On all proper occasions we have taken pains to
spread abroad the impression that this school is designed for the training of teach-
ers and for no other purpose whatever." In the catalogue of 1904 the "Object of the
School" is defined in the following paragraphs:
" In the law creating Normal Schools in this State the following passages occur :
"* The course of instruction shall be confined to such branches of science only
as are usually taught in Normal Schools and which may be necessary to qualify
the students as competent teachers in the public schools of this State.
" ' Every applicant for admission shall undergo an examination in such man-
ner as may be prescribed by the Board [of Regents], and they shall require the ap-
plicant to sign and file with the Secretary of the Board a declaration of intention
to follow the business of teaching in the public schools of this State."*
" The following is the pledge required of every student upon entrance and
registration :
" * I hereby declare that it is my intention to follow the business of teaching in
the public schools of this State, and that I voluntarily enroll myself as a student
in the State Normal School at Warrensburg for the purpose of preparing for
that work.'
"The limits prescribed for the course of study and the form of the pledge
show that but one purpose was contemplated by the State in establishing these
schools, viz.: The training of teachers for the public schools of the State.'"*1
Similarly in 1905 and after, the school's "sole function is the preparation of teach-
ers for the schools of Missouri." " The school does not exist for the benefit of its stu-
dents, but for the benefit of the whole people."2 And in 191S: The school's "sole pur-
pose is to confer on its students that education, discipline, professional training, and
practical skill which will best fit them for teaching in the public schools of the State."3
The schools at Springfield and Mary ville, founded in 1906, have in general followed
the exclusively professional ideal also, as their catalogues attest. Southwest Missouri
has been an unusually fruitful field for such single-minded service, and the school
at Springfield has prospered remarkably. Maryville, in 1914, devotes two pages of
its catalogue to the exposition of this distinctly professional aim. It is with some sur-
prise, therefore, that one sees it weakened in 1916. The school now calls itself simply
"an educational institution," and, besides enumerating the various teacher-groups
that are provided for, invites also those who are "seeking to secure the preliminary
college academic requirement" for the university, or students from other colleges who
seek "to extend their credits in college,"*' and finally observes " that many persons not
immediately concerned with teaching find pleasure and profit in becoming enrolled
in our classes," There is no reference to the declaration of intention to teach required
by law.
1 Catalogue, Warrensburg, 1904, page 15. * Ibid., 1905, page 20. * Ibid., 1912, page 16.
74 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
SPECIAL CONSIDERATIONS AFFECTING A NORMAL SCHOOL'S CONCEPTION OF ITS FUNCTION
Before discussing the merits of the question involved in these divergent proposals,
there are certain additional facts to be considered. In spite of the professional ideal
that, with the above 'exceptions, has dominated the schools, the notion of a general
education has almost unconsciously, and for historical reasons, influenced their pur-
pose. From the beginning the students in these normal schools have been exceed-
ingly heterogeneous, with a preponderance of mature minds of good ability but with
very defective preparation due to lack of opportunity. The all -important preliminary
process was therefore necessarily one of fundamental education, and it is impressive
to note how consistently the Missouri normal schools have urged this principle, even
tho at times they appear to have failed to practise it. Throughout their history they
seem to have been ardent advocates of having something to teach as compared with
certain schools in other states that sacrificed their character on the altar of "method."
PRESSURE FOR ACADEMIC CREDIT
Furthermore, it should be noted that as purveyors to that occupation of teaching
whereby chiefly needy and ambitious boys and girls obtained the means for further
education, these institutions stood in tempting relation to the fuller education that
their students sought. It was a matter of course that the kind of student who came to
the normal school had taught or would teach; teaching was his most obvious resource
for temporary support. Hence in very many cases the student accepted professional
work as a necessary incident, while his real attention was upon the academic work
that would be accepted for credit in another and higher institution. It was but a step,
and a very natural step, for the normal school to develop its requirements with such an
end in view. A genuine desire to prove serviceable to hard-working students who were
using the teaching profession merely as a ladder, and a less worthy feeling that such
students brought to the school not only numbers but prestige, combined to enhance
the "college"" idea as a legitimate goal. Aside from Cape Girardeau's wholly non-pro-
fessional curriculum already mentioned, the sixty-hour curriculum for high school
graduates at Maryville, in 1914, illustrates such a purpose: in the effort to offer only
subjects that might be used for credit elsewhere, no special study of the history,
geography, and arithmetic that these students were presumably later to teach was re-
quired, except as it appeared fragmentarily in ten semester hours of practice teaching.1
That pressure of this sort has been and still continues to be severe seems evident
from the replies made by students to enquiries at the various schools. Sixty per cent
of the students in attendance at the time of inspection declared that they did not in-
tend to teach permanently. With the women the factor of prospective marriage prob-
ably weighs heavily; this cannot, however, be true of the men, seventy-eight per cent
of whom make the negative reply. Such students naturally have little interest in an in-
1 Good normal schools elsewhere were at the same time requiring 12-15 semester hours in these subjects aside from
a full semester of practice work.
GENERAL FUNCTION 75
tensive professional training; those studies please them best which give them the most
credit for future use. Even the men who are intending to continue in the field of edu-
cation find but little inducement in the work properly expected from mosb of the
women. The latter expect to teach, while the men hope to go directly into adminis-
trative positions. As a group the men in the normal schools seem to be a disintegrat-
ing element, yet the efforts made to attract and retain them indicate that their pres-
ence is nevertheless much preferred to a homogeneous professional group more largely
made up of women.
EFFECT OF LOCAL CONTROL
A third motive for stress on general education has arisen from the complete local
attachment and control of the schools. The town or county has paid a heavy bonus
for the location, and naturally exercises proprietorship. The schools are severally in
the hands of local boards, who really own them in behalf of their respective districts.
They are maintained largely, to be sure, out of state funds, but the amount of such
appropriations depends upon the energy and influence of their board members and
friends who lobby vigorously, and is never in any sense the considered proposal of
a state authority directing the institution solely for the good of the whole state.
They become, therefore, the local public educational institutions; and the fundamen-
tal theory of a school to train public servants for the benefit of the state is largely
obscured by the more attractive idea of a place where local youth may prepare for
college, or even pursue collegiate studies and acquire degrees. Town or sectional pride
urges this interpretation on the institution, which IB turn is anxious to recruit its
numbers because of its feeling of responsibility to the local community.1 Regents with
pet notions find an easy field of influence, and often have slight perception of the larger
purpose of the school. One of these urged that, as his school had an old telescope in its
possession, it should undertake collegiate courses in astronomy. Administrators nat-
urally yield most quickly to the forces that feed and affect the school, and when de-
pendent solely upon such local influences can scarcely be blamed if truer ideals seem
distant and impracticable. It is easy, under these circumstances, to include the profes-
sional idea, because, as already pointed out, it fits the economic situation of most of
the student patrons ; but to make it really the sole and sufficient reason for the school's
existence is less easy, and probably cannot be fully accomplished under the present
system of control.
"DEMOCRACY" THE JUSTIFICATION
The situation described in the foregoing paragraph has, of course, developed a the-
ory, or the interpretation of a theory, for its justification. Great emphasis is placed
1 An everywhere vigorous and vocal expression of this town pride rises from the vested interests dependent on the
schools— boarding-houses, stores, churches, and so on. Thus, a writer in the local newspaper of one of the normal
school towns struck a responsive chord when he declared that the present study would undoubtedly discourage
the attendance of men at the school, and send botto men and women to "enrich the boarding? houses of some other
place." Kirksville Express, December 10f 1914T
76 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
on the perfectly valid creed that the people know what they want, and that democracy
in education consists in gratifying their desires. But from this creed there is then
drawn the inference that because the people desire good teachers, the people are
therefore competent to direct the institution that provides them, and that the in-
stitution is most "democratic" that yields itself most completely to the popular local
fancy. Such, unfortunately, are the terms on which it is often possible, thru spectacu-
lar features, to develop a large school; but such is not the way to give the people
what they, at heart, desire. An intelligent society has learned not to interfere with
competent professional service when it would be healed or seek justice at court; that
service commands the maximum confidence which, for a selected end, most completely
refines and dominates its choice of means. This temper is superlatively characteristic
of a good school; it must mould and dominate public opinion in its field; it must
guard its aims and processes from public interference precisely in order that the pub-
lic may get the service that it wants. No other interpretation of public service is
worthy of a democracy, but the present system of local control makes such detached
and efficient service difficult if not impossible.
PROFESSIONAL TRAINING LONG UNCEKTAIN AS TO ITS METHOD
Finally, the development of professional training itself has involved the conception
of general education in an ambiguous and confusing manner. When the Missouri nor-
mal schools were established, two theories existed as to their operation. According to
the first, the purpose of the schools should be solely to teach subject-matter prop-
erly ; it was said that students would teach precisely as they had been taught, and could
shift for themselves if filled with ideas to be communicated. According to the second
theory, only the indispensable subject-matter should be given; the main purpose
should be to develop the philosophy of method and to test the skill of the candidate
in using methods. The latter theory was the one adopted and chiefly followed,1 altho,
as has been said, the schools appear to have insisted usually that the foundation of
subject-matter should be substantial Little by little, however, both in Missouri and
elsewhere, the whole normal school practice seems to have hardened into a formalized
method from which the schools were aroused thru criticism by the universities. The
latter had been persistent adherents of the first of the two doctrines noted; conse-
quently the cult of "method1' received little but ridicule, and in so far as it had de-
veloped a pose to hide its insufficient learning, its pretensions were quickly punctured.
Under the fire of this attack many unworthy accretions of "professional "lore disap-
peared— sentimentalism, mystic reverence for formulae, a not infrequent quackery;
while such conceptions as survived the refining process were eventually accepted for
use in normal school and university alike.
Apart from this salutary process, however, and somewhat preceding it, came an
1 These two points of view are well stated in one of Superintendent Monteith's discussions. See State ReportrlBt%,
page 37.
GENERAL FUNCTION 77
increased mechanical emphasis on what the university primarily stood for, namely,
content. In Missouri this is illustrated by the change that came over all the institu-
tions about 1900, when within two years the headship in each was transferred to a
new man. The university high school inspector and former state superintendent of
public schools went to Kirksville with a commission from the president of the univer-
sity to "go and put scholarship into that school.'5"' The president of Central College
at Fayette, Missouri, went to Warrensburg, and a successful school superintendent,
a graduate of the state university, went to Cape Girardeau. The effect of this infu-
sion of fresh academic blood became immediately apparent in the announcements
of the schools: the cultural idea; the proposal, in order to make teachers, to make
" first educated men and women;" the notion of "a broad academic foundation " are
all insistently emphasized. Accordingly, the studies considered "academic" were set
off sharply from those termed " professional,'1 and commanded a certain special respect
if only because they were terms shared in common with the higher academic world;
and this distinction has in general been pronounced even to the present day. ~
The influence of this development has been marked both on the students and on
the institutions. In effect the school has unconsciously said to the student: "This
academic foundation is your education; it is of prime importance, it has nothing to
do with teaching, it is what you want for life, it will serve you if you proceed to col-
lege or professional school; as a teacher-preparing agency we are obliged to hang in
your belt certain tools that will get you a license and may be useful if you teach, but
they are not big enough to be in the way if you do not, and an educated person ought
to have them anyhow." Thus its very endeavors to meet more satisfactorily its pro-
fessional purpose by strengthening the academic foundation haye created in the nor-
mal school a divided aim which it has not known how to unify, and of which the
various other centrifugal tendencies already enumerated have taken full advantage.
In its effect upon the institution itself this situation has been positively disastrous.
With the emphatic division of subjects into academic and professional groups came
naturally a corresponding division of the staff. Teachers of educational subjects,
including the practice-school director and supervisors, should be the core of the in-
stitution; distinct from them are the academic instructors, who generally will have
nothing to do with the practice school or its works. In members of the academic
staff, pride of subject, and often of better training, has bred not a little scorn (car-
ried over, perhaps, from the universities from whence they came) for the department
of "pedagogy" and the ill-paid supervisors of the training school. At any rate, these
academic instructors have rarely been selected for their knowledge of how to teach
young children; their interests and sympathies are elsewhere, and the organization
of the school has usually failed to exact of them responsibility for this phase of their
duty.
In some normal schools, not in Missouri, the faculty is split from top to bottom
on this line, and even in Missouri, with the sole exception of Springfield, the cleavage
78 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
Is apparent. The inevitable, tendency of such division of sympathy and purpose is to
reproduce itself in the mind of the student. His strictly educational courses lack con-
viction because they lack relation, and fail of the illustrative and cumulative force
latent in the so-called "content" subjects; the latter, in turn, conceived as ends in
themselves for "general education," terminate often in a series of blind alleys whence
the student neither gets further nor sees how his achievement affects his main purpose.
g. NOEMAL SCHOOLS SHOULD TRAIN TEACHERS
It is the judgment of the authors of this report that institutions established by the
state to prepare teachers as public servants for its schools should make that business
their sole purpose and concern. The character of such preparation is a question of ad-
ministrative knowledge and policy. It will depend upon the amount of financial sup-
port available, and will be modified by the varying need for teachers in the state and
by the rewards offered in the communities to be served. But with their method and
specific goal thus defined, no consideration whatever should divert such schools from
their task.
The grounds for this conclusion are simple and obvious. The question is one of
institutional economy. Each school has a certain amount of energy expressed in terms
of its annual appropriation plus its organization and permanent plant. With this en-
ergy it confronts a definite and difficult task contemplated in the statute,1 namely,
with the help of four similar schools and of the university, to place a competent teacher
in every teaching position in the state. This is a task with which these six schools have
scarcely begun to cope. It is a task so great that large and important portions of it
have temporarily to be farmed out, as in the inevitable allotment for the present of
the teachers of the large cities to the city training schools, and of rural teachers to the
high school training classes. Hitherto the schools have trained a few teachers thor-
oughly, and have given a meagre smattering to a vast number. Even the few have
received a generalized training which will not be tolerable longer if the reasonable
demands of educated communities are to be met in Missouri as they are already met
in some other states. There is an overwhelming need for more prolonged and more
intensive training, extended to include as many as can be reached. In the face of this
heavy obligation which the state lays upon the normal schools, it is difficult to jus-
tify the proposal of any school, say of Cape Girardeau, to use its share of the all too
scanty training funds to develop a local university, This means, as indicated in the
prospectus already quoted, to relegate its training of teachers to an inconspicuous
department ; to promote the other phases of collegiate work for their own sake and
not alone as they produce better teachers; to fill classes, as college classes are BOW
filled, with some who will teach, some who will farm, some who will be politicians,
1The Revised Statutes of 1909 declare that '''the course of instruction in each normal school shall be confined to
such subjects in the sciences and arts as are usually taught in normal schools and necessary to Qualify the stu-
dents to become competent teachers in the public schools." See Chap. 106, Art. 14, Sect. 11071. An Act of 1919 ex-
tends this to include ** such subjects in the arts and sciences as are usually taught in teachers' colleges, normal
schools or schools of education." Sect. 11075.
GENERAL FUNCTION 79
and many who have no specific purpose; in other words, to sacrifice the enormous
advantage of momentum and morale that inheres in a single fine idea well worked
out, for a round of inevitable mediocrity. For the school has at best wholly insuffi-
cient funds for its present logical purpose — the preparation of a competent teacher
for every position in its district. To take over other projects, as these are conceived
in modern education, is not only to fail in its proper task but to fail altogether.
The case of Cape Girardeau is especially interesting, inasmuch as for many years
both regents and administration have made every effort to realize this "larger"
notion. Elaborate advanced "college" curricula, special scholarships "for graduates
from other colleges," and an enthusiastic literature have all pushed the idea. But only
a single graduate has as yet (1917) gone out from such courses; the school is still
as solely a normal school as is any of the other four. And with good reason : Cape
Girardeau has taken pride in being a good school, and both teachers and students
have dimly perceived that it was impossible to be a good normal school and a "great
college" on the same appropriation. There is doubtless truth in the claim that, as
college attendance is in great part local, more southeast Missourians would go to col-
leo-e if they had one nearby. But it is just as true that a good normal school is a pro-
fessional school throughout and cannot be an arts college; if it wishes to conduct
a college that is self-respecting, it must have double funds, separate classes, another
faculty selected for that purpose, and so on. The combination is not a happy one in
any place where it is now on trial, and the logic both of theory and experience is
against it. The college agitation at Cape Girardeau has probably done good rather
than harm; some public interest has been aroused, and a college foundation may
some time seize the imagination of the wealthy men of that region or be developed
from the local high school by way of a junior college as elsewhere in Missouri ; but
the obvious way to help in bringing about this result is for the present institution to
discharge its own peculiar task well, and to fix its ambitions on becoming the best
purely professional training school for teachers in the Middle West.
Cape Girardeau is an excellent illustration of a school appropriated body and soul
by the local community in the hope of making it the engine of local ambitions. The
town and county bought the school in the first place, and can scarcely be blamed
for owning it now. Fortunately state control of the funds, by forcing it into com-
parison with the other schools, still determines its general line of action, but it can
probably never reach its maximum power until it acquires a controlling board dis-
entangled from local concerns and sympathetic with its proper purpose. Reimburse-
ment of this and the other counties for their original outlay would be a small price
to pay as compared with the benefit of independent management,
OBSTACLES TO PROFESSIONAL TRAINING ARE DISAPPEARING
Other obstacles to an exclusive and intensive professional development in normal
schools are happily vanishing. Secondary work, to which the normal schools have hith-
80 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
erto of necessity been tied, seems destined early to disappear from them. The phe-
nomenal increase in high school facilities has brought secondary education within the
possible reach of nearly every student,1 and the higher institution owes it to the lower
to turn back every pupil of high school age who can attend a local or neighboring
school before coming to the normal school. Many of these country high schools have
large contingents who come in for the week from the surrounding territory. Especially
where training classes are installed, every consideration appears to favor the develop-
ment of local training centres for secondary work. Mature persons, for whom the high
school makes unsatisfactory provision, should be given opportunities elsewhere*2
The question of relation with other higher institutions is likewise being disposed of
successfully. As this problem has existed, however, an important distinction should be
made clear. It is one thing for those who have taken a strictly professional course and
who expect to give themselves seriously to teaching to urge that they be allowed to
continue their preparation in other institutions without loss of credit; it is quite
another thing for persons who have no such intention to demand that the normal
school give them a general education that will see them into college and professional
school. For the first group adjustment has already been accomplished. Two-year
graduates of the normal school may enter the School of Education at the university
without serious loss of credit, and the recent conference arrangement between nor-
mal schools and university provides that students doing four years of standard work
at a normal school may be admitted to graduate work in education at the univer-
sity. The second group should be dealt with drastically, as the institution values its
professional integrity. If elementary and high school instruction in this country is
ever to be cleared of its traditionally random and trivial reputation, training agen-
cies must insist on a curriculum so specific in character as to make its choice a fateful
step in an individual's career. There will doubtless always be quondam teachers who
fail and practise law, just as there are quondam physicians who fail and sell insurance,
but it is intolerable for an honest training school so to relax its administration and
enfeeble its courses as to put the transient at ease. Every normal school student should
feel behind him a full tide of pressure from every quarter urging him to teach and to
do nothing else, and he should contribute the impetus of his own clear decision to the
general impulse.
UNITY OF AIM INCREASING
Finally, in the professional training itself there are discernible strong tendencies
making for unity. The present schism in staff and curriculum was the result, at first,
of the difficulty of securing competent teachers of academic subjects who possessed
likewise a thorough training in education and successful experience in teaching chil-
dren and youth. This is still an unusual combination, but, thanks to rapid growth of
schools of education and to improved product in the normal schools, it is becoming
1 See page 297. a See pag-e 300.
GENERAL FUNCTION 81
less rare. In the case of the curriculum, the result seems to have been due partly to
unsympathetic instructors, but more largely to a desire on all sides to swing as far as
possible toward the collegiate idea and away from the earlier attitude. It is now evi-
dent that this emphasis has been greatly overdone. The normal school that is true to
itself rinds it impossible to be a college. A genuine professional purpose makes itself
felt much further than the purely technical subjects; it governs the selection of mate-
rial for every curriculum, it grips every course that is offered, and that in no perfunc-
tory fashion as formerly, but with a clear, scientific conception of the ultimate aim
in view. "With a mission like this, why waste time trying to be a college?" is the con-
vincing retort of the modern training school. Again, if this clearer definition of aim
affects the attendance of men at the schools, let the situation be faced frankly. There
is nothing to be gained for the profession of teaching by catering to a set of individ-
uals who definitely intend to make their normal school course and a year's teaching
a step to other work. Such a procedure cheapens the course for its proper candidates,
and advertises most effectually that teaching is a makeshift occupation and prepara-
tion therefor a farce. It is certainly most desirable to make the teaching profession at-
tractive to men; but, given higher financial rewards, the surest way to convince them
that there is something to it is to make it genuinely selective in respect to length and
character of preparation. If they cannot be held on these terms, there is no help for it;
any other condition is illusory and dishonest.
A NOEMAL SCHOOLS OBLIGATION TO THE STATE
The efficient teacher-training school of any grade is not to be measured by college,
university, law, medical, or other liberal or professional institutions. These operate
indirectly for the general good, but their direct aim is rather the intellectual or voca-
tional benefit of the individual. The school for teachers, on the other hand, is the
immediate instrument of the state for providing a given number and quality of public
servants to discharge the main collective obligation of society to the next generation.
Salaried staffs of physicians or lawyers supported by state or city for the whole people
would imply a similar function in medical and law schools. Even so, the large number
of teachers required, in proportion to the number of doctors and lawyers, would tend
to elaborate and standardize the teacher-training agencies above other schools. Private
and outside sources would not play so large a part, nor would such wide individual
variation be acceptable in preparing five thousand as in furnishing three hundred.
In view of this peculiar relation to the state it is evident that, to be effective, the
training institution should have two characteristics in a preeminent degree. First, it
should have a vivid purpose. Its sole aim being to train teachers, every item of its or-
ganization should contribute either to the final excellence of its product, or to the
creation and maintenance of conditions in its region that will make its product most
successful. Irrelevant work that can be done elsewhere should be discontinued as soon
as possible; bogus or uncertain candidates should be rejected; diversions of aim, how-
83 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL 'SCHOOL
ever attractive, should be avoided. The school should do one thing and do it mightily.
In the second place, it should be wholly responsive. First and last it serves the state
and not individuals; as an efficient instrument it must be sensitive to control. New
types or altered numbers of teachers, fresh courses to be added, higher standards to
be set, — all of these should find the training school prepared for continual and auto-
matic readjustment. The informed and authorized directors of the state's educational
policy — and the state should obviously have such directors — should not find them-
selves helpless because of institutional conservatism, opposition of alumni, or local en-
tanglements. To ensure this, the school clearly should not be entrusted to an irrespon-
sible head for personal exploitation; the measure of excellence in administration should
be a quiet and rapid accommodation to the changing demands of the state's educa-
tional authority. The loyalty of alumni should be won, not for persons or places, but
for the skill with which the school does its work and for its flexible adaptation to its
duties ; the head of an institution who, by personal appeal to numerous or powerful
graduates, seeks to swing his own policy at all costs is abusing his ti*ust. Finally, to be
responsive, the school must be free from local pressure and interference. The state as
a whole invariably wants for itself better things, and defines those wants more wisely
than can be the case in any but highly developed urban districts. To tie a school
down to the limited vision of a small area is to deprive the community of that margin
of superiority which the whole state has achieved and formulated.
B. SCOPE OF ORGANIZATION
The successful administration of a school for the preparation of teachers depends
upon a precise definition of the ground it is to cover. The total field is very exten-
sive, and with the development of modern educational requirements, presupposes a
multitude of curricula and a wealth of equipment unimagined at an earlier period.
A historical survey is essential,
1. HISTORICAL VIEW
The plan of operations in the early Missouri normal schools is nowhere better in-
dicated than in the following paragraphs from the Kirks ville catalogue of 1876, under
the caption "Professional Department:"
"The Fifst Year's Work embraces: 'How to Maintain Vigorous Health,'4 How
to Study," 'How to Recite,' 'How to Organize and Govern a Country School,'
and 'How to Teach the Common Branches."' The elevation of country schools is
the grandest work of the age and is the peculiar mission of the Normal School*
** The Second Year's Work includes: 'Methods of Culture,' 'Practice Teaching,*
and 'Graded Schools.' Methods of culture are based on an oral course in men-
tal philosophy. Educational principles are evolved, and these are made the basis
of the art of teaching. Teachers are fitted to take charge of primary and gram-
mar school departments of graded schools, and of the best country schools.
SCOPE OF ORGANIZATION 83
" The Third Year is devoted to the thorough study of Psychology and methods
of cultivating every power of the soul. While good use is made of the best books
on mental and moral philosophy, much of the instruction is necessarily oral. It is
left for the future to produce works on these subjects prepared from the educa-
tional standpoint. The value of the third year's work to student teachers cannot
be estimated. It opens up to the student a new world, and revolutionizes his mode
of thought. Here is laid the solid foundation for the science of education, and
for artistic teaching. Teachers are prepared to work in graded and high schools.
" The Work of the Fourth Year is directed to fitting teachers for the best
positions, such as principals, assistants, professors, and county superintendents.
The teachers of this grade are prepared to discuss philosophically the great edu-
cational questions. The history of education, the philosophy of education, the
graded and high school work, the superintendency and the institute work, en-
gage special attention."1
The interesting feature of this prospectus is the fidelity with which the scheme
reflects the situation then existing: promotion is the fundamental idea, and consists
in mounting the educational ladder from the rural school to the graded town school,
thence to the high school and superintendency, to be followed by "institute" or normal
school work; for such rise in the scale the normal school course Is intended to prepare
year by year. One grade of teaching with a little added study constitutes suitable
preparation for the next; the thought of each kind of work as a goal in itself, worthy
of extended and special preparation and of equal dignity with any other, does not
occur. For the rural teacher the time when he shall become a "principal, professor,
or county superintendent" is the zenith of desire; when at the summit he may doubt-
less aspire higher. This conception of promotion was the outcome partly of primitive
educational economics, partly of a meagre knowledge of teaching, and is yielding
but slowly as reward increases and professional preparation develops. Altho the old
notion still governs much of our practice, we are to-day nearer the time when, with a
prolonged initial preparation, a skilful teacher may look forward to recognition and
promotion within the field of service where he did his first teaching.
EARLY WORK CHIEFLY FOR ELEMENTARY TEACHERS
Candidates for the two advanced years of the early curriculum given above were
few, and the normal schools soon found that their chief work was to be with short-
term students in search of the little learning that would enable them to obtain the
low grade certificates required by law. In 1878 President Baldwin of Kirksville re-
ported "over forty classes daily in the elementary " first two years "and but ten in the
advanced course."2 "A number attend but one or two terms; most remain from one
to two years."3 So, too, at Cape Girardeau in 188$: "Much the larger part of the
normal work is necessarily devoted to the elementary course."* The state superin-
tendent interpreted the situation exactly when he declared :
1 Catalogue, KirTcsmlle, 1876, page 22.
2 State Report, 1878, page 217. * Ibid., 1874* page 45. * Ibid., 1882, page 169.
84 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
"It must be borne in mind that the chief business of our normal schools is to fit
teachers for the common primary and grammar schools of the state. We can from
the office of Superintendent of Public Schools furnish at almost any time the
applications of as many qualified teachers as are needed for all the public high
schools in the state, thoseof St. Louis alone excepted. Our common district schools
in the country are suffering for the want of improved teachers. It is the manifest
duty of our normal schools to aim at the supply of this demand. Then we must
arrange in such a manner, if possible, as to allow this partially fitted teacher,
after a brief term of practice, to return to the normal and increase his stock of
teaching material by another term of study."1
The normal schools took up this task with loyalty and energy. While endeavor-
ing to maintain standards by selective examinations for promotion and graduation,
the institutions became genuine evangelistic centres sending into the highways for all
who could be persuaded to come in. "However advanced, or however backward, stu-
dents will be received and assigned to such classes as they are prepared to enter." 3
" The professional course is arranged to meet the wants of the most advanced stu-
dents as well as those least advanced."3 "Come for a year if possible; if not, a single
term will be of great value. While only brave, determined teachers will graduate, all
will be greatly benefited," " Nearly all our students are from the rural districts and
about nine tenths of them pay their own expenses chiefly by teaching in the public
schools of the state. The institution is organized and conducted with special reference
to this class of students."4 Such expressions abound in the catalogues.
The gospel was preached directly also. Joseph Baldwin at Kirks ville records: "Each
member of the regular faculty aims to spend all vacations in institute work. During
the year I attended twenty institutes and besides gave a considerable number of edu-
cational lectures — traveling over six thousand miles. Professor Greenwood did nearly
as much. For the most part we paid our own traveling expenses.5'5 James Johonnot
from New York State, the second president at Warrensburg, rebelled at this, claim-
ing that teachers needed the summer vacation for recuperation and further study;6
but he remained only a short time. His successor, George L. Osborne, and all his fac-
ulty, were as devoted apostles to the rural teacher as was Baldwin. The same spirit pre-
vailed also at Cape Girardeau, where, as late as 1895, President Vandiver declared
that "any teacher who draws a reasonable salary from the state during ten months
of the year should be willing to spend two or three weeks of the vacation in bringing
the cause of education before the people and showing them the advantages of the nor-
mal school.""7 It was undoubtedly the Baldwin-Osborne energy that Missouri needed
at this time, and a great debt is due these whole-hearted workers among the rugged
and capable but uninstructed youth of the state.
1 State Report, 1871, page 18.
2 Catalogue, Kirk&uille, 1878-74, page 32. 8 Ibid., page 15. * Ibid., 1879, page 21.
c State Report, 1872, page 166. 6 Ibid., 1873, page 122. 7 Ibid,, 1895, page 90.
SCOPE OF ORGANIZATION 85
OF HlGH SCHOOL TEACHERS
Meanwhile preparation for advanced positions was by no means forgotten. As was
seen above in tlie Kirksville prospectus, the students and graduates of the last two
years were intended to become high school teachers or administrative officers, and
this part of the school's plan receives frequent mention in the reports and catalogues.
" While we labor to fit our graduates for teaching in graded and high schools, our
principal efforts are directed to preparing teachers for the common schools of the
state." * " It has been found necessary to organize classes in Greek to meet the wants
of those preparing to teach in High Schools."2 "'The additional training offered in the
advanced section is intended to qualify the full course graduate for teaching in graded
and high schools. Our judgment in this respect is fully confirmed by the successful
work now being done by graduates."3 "The classification, gradation, and manage-
ment of graded schools is given special attention that teachers may be fitted for the
best positions as principals, assistants, and superintendents.5'4 The state superintend-
ent in 1871 found the tendency to do advanced work at the outset very strong. He
says: "The Board of Regents occupies an unenviable position midway between the
praiseworthy ambition of instructors on the one hand, and the clamor of the people
for trained teachers on the other. The instructor, of course, prefers to turn out a fin-
ished job and is inclined to retain the pupil until he becomes fitted for a thorough
high school teacher. No one can doubt that the highest possible amount of personal
culture is desirable, even in the teacher of the primary school. But the people cannot
wait long for something a little better than that which they now have." 5
NORMAL SCHOOLS AND HIGH SCHOOLS
It will be worth while to digress for a moment at this point and note how second-
ary education in Missouri was chiefly built up — a consideration that may throw light
on the relations existing between the normal schools and the high schools. In 1870
the number of tax-supported schools equipped to prepare students for the university,
even with the low requirements of that period, was certainly fewer than ten, and these
were in the chief centres of population.6 In the same year, however, the county super-
intendents report sixty-seven "high schools," of which doubtless a good specimen is
described by the superintendent at Brookfield in Linn County a year or so later. He
says: "In the higher department we have classes in algebra, geometry, physical geog-
raphy, and Latin. I have as yet seen nothing in the school law that provides for the
instruction of classes in those higher branches of study in our public schools. The pol-
icy may be questionable of taxing the public for the purpose of giving an academic
education to the few who may wish to avail themselves of it. At present our school is
attracting numerous pupils from other districts, and it has already become an insti-
1 State Keport, 1874, page 45 (Kirksville), * Catalogue, KirJcsvUle, 1874-75, page 26,
8 State Report, 1894, page 202 ( Warrensburg). * Catalogue, KirTcsvitte, 1862, page 56.
6 State Xlepwt, 1871, page 18. 6 2Md., 1873, pa&e 28.
86 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
tution of which our citizens may be truly proud."1 This is the situation in a nutshell:
an intelligent, ambitious community, and a good grammar school teacher who had
studied Latin; tentative beginnings without warrant in law; pride in the prestige
secured in the surrounding region, and satisfaction in the tuition fees from outside
pupils. In similar and smaller communities it seems probable that very many begin-
nings were made by enterprising teachers who could give instruction in the subjects
requisite for a teaching certificate. Such centres as could supply this instruction be-
came training schools for the whole region roundabout,2 and these incipient normal
schools — protuberances, as it were, on the elementary schools beneath — grew and
finally took independent shape in one, two, or three year high schools. In the East the
high schools were generally converted academies or were established fully formed on
that model; in Missouri the typical high school emerged gradually from the vigor-
ous elementary school.
It is evident from the nature of this development that such high schools as these,
in so far as they were related to any higher institution, had their dealings with the
normal schools where their teachers were prepared and to which many of their stu-
dents went directly. As their advanced work became an established feature, the best
of the elementary teachers were assigned to it; in fact, down to a late date the small
high schools taught little else in their first year than grammar school subjects.3 The
university, on the other hand, when it began to be conscious of the importance of high
schools as feeders, took formal account only of those large schools that could prepare
students for it. Some influence in behalf of the university was doubtless exerted by
teachers in small schools who had attended the sub-collegiate training department
that existed during this early period at the university, but these must have been
quickly outnumbered by teachers sent out from the normal schools.
It can be readily understood, therefore, that the normal schools from their earliest
moments, knowing of these scattered efforts to develop high school departments out
of the elementary school, and aware of the intimate and natural relation that such
efforts must bear to themselves rather than to the university, should consider it a
part of their business to train these teachers, who at that time could really be trained
nowhere else. In 1890, twenty years after our previous estimate, twenty-seven four-
year high schools are reported, together with thirty-eight three-year and sixty-five
two-year schools;* no reference is made to the probably large number of elementary
school centres where less than two years of high school work was attempted. By far
the greater portion of this short course work was certainly done by teachers who, if
trained at all, had graduated from the normal schools or had attended them; the rela-
tive proportions may be judged fairly enough from the present situation, when the
normal schools are responsible for training forty-six per cent of the teachers in first
class high schools outside of St. Louis and Kansas City; seventy-three per cent in sec-
ond and third class schools; and seventy-six per cent in wholly unapproved schools.
1 State Report, 1873, page 167. 2 Ibid., 1871, page 17. 8 Ibid., 1900, page 27. * Ibid., 1889, page 11.
SCOPE OF ORGANIZATION 87
With such an overwhelming personal interest and concern in these smaller high
schools as is shown by the above figures, it would have been indefensible for the nor-
mal schools not to employ every means at their disposal to strengthen these teachers
as much as possible. The same thing may be said of the smaller principalships and
superintendences.1 Many a normal school graduate has succeeded as a teacher, and
has stepped ahead into an administrative position, not because he had the ideal train-
ing for that position, but because there was no one with better training who would
compete with him at that level. He felt at home in the normal school and would
return thither for his further education ; courses that would help him were the natural
sequel, and under the circumstances cannot be fairly criticised.
HIGH SCHOOLS AND UNIVERSITY
As the normal school's sphere of influence developed upward with the rapid growth
of the high school system in the manner above described, the university was almost
as rapidly extending its own territory. For accredited schools, inter-university and
associational agreements determined certain standards of qualification for instructors
which the normal schools could not meet; unaccredited schools desiring eventual recog-
nition sought to reach the university standard, to the prejudice of normal-trained
teachers, and it became evident that if the normal schools were to hold what they
had come to consider their own, an entire readjustment must be made. The agitation
for this readjustment has filled the years since 1900 and deserves special notice.
READJUSTMENT OF NOKMAL SCHOOLS FOE HIGHER INSTRUCTION
After disposing of their elementary or "sub-normal" work, the normal schools, in
1904, took the first radical step in raising their curriculum from the previous four-year
high school level. It was mutually agreed to organize their work on an eighteen-unit
basis, and to allow a credit of ten of these units for a four-year high school course,
thus making it necessary for a high school graduate to complete eight units, or regu-
larly two years of work, for a diploma and a professional degree. This brought the
last two years of the normal school parallel with the first two years of the college or
university, and left a gap between normal and elementary school that was variously
bridged. In the same year the University of Missouri organized its School of Education,
primarily for the training of high school teachers and supervisors, and the normal
schools at once announced theij* proposed competition by offering to give the degree
of A,B.2 The immediate motive for this action is said to have been the failure of
negotiations for the acceptance of normal school credits by the university. That it
1 Sixty-nine per cent of the superintendents in towns having first class high schools in 1915 had attended Missouri
state normal schools, In second and third class high school districts eighty-five per cent had attended normal
schools. Among the latter are counted the principals of the schools where there were no superintendents. See
page 376, note 4,
2 All catalogues, 1904. At Warrensburg this proposal was withdrawn in 1906, but was introduced again in 1907. Cape
Girardeau had offered the A.B. degree since 1902.
88 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
had been in mind for some time for other reasons, however, is clear from the statement
in the report from Cape Girardeau to the State Superintendent in 1901: "The nor-
mal schools must offer a full college education. They must reach that standard grad-
ually, but the purpose should be plainly stated to make them in a few years normal
colleges."511 The Kirks ville catalogue of 1903 discusses the question as follows: "The
normal school finds itself compelled to give other and higher courses. For the past two
years there has been a constant and increasing demand for graduate (i.e. third-year)
courses. At this time thirty persons holding diplomas of normal schools and col-
leges are working in our various graduate classes. Twenty-five of these are graduates
of our own four-year (Le. two-year college) courses. They claim that the instruction
which they can get here is more concrete and better adapted to their purposes than
the instruction which they can get elsewhere."2
All of this, together with the formal establishment of a full college curriculum in
1904, would seem to indicate a considerable call for advanced work. Yet in spite of
the "demand," it was not until 1907 that Kirks ville first succeeded in graduating a
single student from this course, and one more was given the degree in 1908 after
graduation from another institution; none appeared in 1909. Eight years (1904—12)
were required to give nineteen students the four-year degree;, even of the "thirty
persons in our various graduate classes" reported in 1908, only four appear to have
taken the three-year diploma in that year. Cape Girardeau did somewhat better, grad-
uating twenty-seven in all by 1912, and thirty-six since that time (1913-17). Kirks-
ville graduated one hundred forty-four from 1912 to 1917.3
RESULTS OF REORGANIZATION
In general it may be said that the schools have been able to provide but a minimum
of genuinely advanced work for four-year graduates, most of their courses being neces-
sarily taken with freshmen and sophomores and some even with secondary students.
Where advanced work was offered, the teachers in charge, while generally capable, have
not had the training reasonably expected of competent directors of junior and senior
college work, and have had almost their whole experience with secondary or early col-
1 State Report, 1901, page 63. 2 Catalogue, KirTcsvitte, 1908, page 12.
8 The movement for granting bachelor's degrees has been confined, largely to Cape Girardeau and Kirksville. War-
rensburg has participated, but to a smaller degree in proportion to her much larger enrolment. Fifteen had taken
the degree at Warrensburg up to the time this study was begun in 1914; forty more had graduated by 1917,
making fifty-five in all. Of these slightly over half came from the county where the school is located— -all but three
from the town of Warrensburg. Of the sixty- three graduates from Cape Girardeau, nine were from the faculty or
their families, while twelve lived in remote parts of the district from which the university or some other good
college is equally or more accessible; forty, or sixty-three per cent, including" the faculty group, lived in Cape
Girardeau or close by, leaving ten, or sixteen per cent, to represent the accessible part of the district at large. One
came from another state. At Kirksville eleven were regular members of the faculty at the time of taking the
degree; eight of these received degrees without doing work in residence. Nearly three-fifths of the four-year
degrees granted, 1907-16, were secured by residents of Adair County. The residence of later recipients was not pub-
lished. Reports from the school indicate forty per cent of local graduates in 1917 and 1918. Maryville granted her
first four-year degrees in 1917, when twelve students graduated; fifteen graduated in 1918. Of these twenty-seven
students, eighteen lived in Maryville or close by, and three lived in adjoining counties ; two others were already col-
lege graduates, and nine were paid various amounts by the school as assistants. Springfield graduated one in 1918
and twenty-eight from 1915 to 1917. Ten of these lived in Springfield or the immediate neighborhood ; seven came
from outside the district, and five were regularly employed members of the teaching staff.
SCOPE OF ORGANIZATION 89
lege classes. Thus it has resulted that graduation from a four-year course has been
merely a matter of amassing a sufficient number of elementary credits of an almost
unrestricted variety, — a practice disapproved by all reputable colleges, — instead of
representing definite progress in sequence thru an organized curriculum which is re-
quired by good collegiate procedure. A third characteristic calculated to cheapen these
courses has been the pace at which they have been taken. Cape Girardeau, running
nominally on a schedule of fifteen credit hours per week, has permitted an actual
median of seventeen hours for the collegiate student body with still more for a very
large proportion, and in addition has allowed a differential bonus by which the two
highest ratings earned respectively fifteen and thirty per cent more credit. At Kirks-
ville this speeding-up has taken the extraordinary form of a private and arbitrary
distribution of credit, based solely on the personal judgment of the head of the in-
stitution.1
In view of these conditions, it is not surprising that the University of Missouri
should decline to accept hour for hour the work of the degree courses in these in-
stitutions until some arrangement for acceptable standards of work could be made.
Since this study began, such an arrangement has been achieved, and the conference
agreement of June 2£, 1916, stipulates these standards and provides for full mutual
recognition of credit. It now remains to be seen to what extent the normal schools can
meet university standards for advanced collegiate work on their present appropria-
tions and at the same time provide satisfactorily for the secondary and junior college
work that is expected of them. The large increases in the one hundred twenty hour
classes in 1917 and 1918 are admittedly due to the new arrangement. Fairness to
their students should therefore inspire the schools to enforce their revised standards
to the letter.
At the present time, as in their early careers, the Missouri normal schools regard
their efforts as properly catholic in scope and as destined to comprise the preparation
of every sort of teacher "from the highest to the lowest." The idea is clearly stated
in one of the catalogues for 1916: "The function of the normal school is to pre-
pare efficient teachers for all grades and classes of public schools including primary
teachers, rural teachers, grade teachers, high school teachers, principals and superin-
tendents. To limit it will of necessity make it less efficient at all points."
2. HOW SHOULD THE SCOPE 0$ A NORMAL SCHQOI/S ACTIVITIES BE DETERMINED?
For a professional institution already in operation the question of the ground to
be covered is a double problem of resources and needs. This assumes, however, that
the character of the proposed curricula and their cost are already fully understood.
The first and fundamental question to be answered should be : What does it imply
in number and quality of instructors, in equipment and organization, to give in a
first class manner the kinds of training in view? and the next: How many of these
1 See page 838.
90 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
kinds of training can we undertake with the funds at our disposal ? and the third :
Considering the types of teacher needed, and the other agencies supplying them, in
what direction, if at all, is it advisable for us, as experts in state education, to urge
the extension of our facilities? The precedence which an institution actually gives
these questions in regulating its operations is a very fair measure both of its sense of
obligation to the state and of its right to be considered a good higher institution.
" STANDARD"" INSTITUTIONS AND OTHEES
It will, of course, be granted that past and, to some extent, present conditions in
raany localities interfere seriously with the normal school that would do standard
work; the need is often such that apparently the only justification for a school's ex-
istence is for it to spread itself out over the whole field, and help every teacher who
applies to be a little better than he was before. Informal efforts of this kind are desira-
ble and necessary; with reading circles, correspondence work, and other loosely organ-
ized schemes for self-improvement they have a well-earned place. The trouble conies
when such a Chautauqua-like institution loses its power of self-recognition, and an-
nounces that its all-inclusive achievements represent the best that men know; when
it seeks to match its uncritical attitude and promiscuous procedure, however well
intended, with institutions that meet national standards.
A certain school, for example, decides that with its funds it is justified in offering
three standard curricula : one for teachers in grammar grades, another for teachers of
intermediate grades, and the third for primary teachers. It maintains a faculty of in-
structors especially trained and experienced in these departments; it pays them $£500
to $8000 a year, employs them fifteen hours per week, and provides opportunity with-
out loss of salary for their occasional release for study. It discriminates in its admis-
sions to the curriculum, selecting only those students who are well prepared; it re-
quires continuous attendance upon instruction in fair-sked homogeneous groups thru
a series of courses organized to give thorough training for specific positions. Such a
school deserves to be called a "standard" institution, since it is doing its work under
conditions known to be excellent. Another school with the same amount of income
offers to train teachers of every kind. It has a staff some members of which receive fair
salaries, but which includes many of its own recent graduates and even advanced stu-
dents who are teaching for credit at low figures. The educational equipment of most
of these instructors is " general; " in many cases their only experience is that of super-
intendent in a small town. Shifts from one department to another are not uncom-
mon. Teachers must instruct for twenty- five periods per week, in the summer session
sometimes for thirty-five, and take time off at their own expense, if not at their own
risk. There is no specific entrance requirement for students except a general/'sizing-
up" at the office; students, if sufficiently plausible, may take most of their high school
work while going thru the "college." To accommodate one-term students, courses are
organized in twelve-week or even six- week fractions, which may be taken topsy-turvy,
SCOPE OF ORGANIZATION 91
whenever students feel like coming. Nearly everything is elective; the same classes
admit alike those who will teach in primary, those who will teach in intermediate, and
those who will teach in grammar grades, as well as others who will seek high school
positions or principalships, and still others who are piecing together four years of such
courses for an "A.B." Secondary and collegiate students recite together; as many
courses as possible are therefore "general."1'1 Such courses are likewise justified on the
theory that no one can tell until after two or more years of this treatment just what
it has fitted him for. Experience proves that he takes the highest paid job of any kind
that turns up? regardless of his "training." To cap the climax, this school has the
courage to assert that its performance is as worthy as the best, and to demand equal
recognition.
These two examples illustrate a contrast in fundamental conceptions of education.
Given the same amount of income, the first school is its own severest critic at every
point, while the second criticises only those who attack it. The first asks always, "What
is a suitable and adequate training for this position ?" and "Can we provide this with
our resources?" The other enquires first, "Is there anything that any normal school or
college gives that we do not offer?" and then declares, "Let us advertise it, and give
as much of it as we must so far as this requires no additional facilities or expenditure."
One is a genuine moral leader, limiting its program strictly to that wherein it can
express the whole truth; the other is a popular and stiperficial educational exploiter.
Hence, if there is virtue in doing a thing thoroughly well and a limit to legisla-
tive appropriations, it is impossible to endorse the above quoted declaration that to
"limit" a normal school in any way "will of necessity make it less efficient at all
points." We justly view with increasing suspicion individuals and institutions that
multiply their avowed aims while their resources remain the same; normal schools can
be no exception. In every other form of human effort, to limit and concentrate is to
strengthen and achieve. No better illustration of this could be found than the Spring-
field school ; more than ninety-nine out of every one hundred enrolled there have re-
ceived the strictly limited type of training in which the school is strongest. The prod-
uct has been relatively sound because the bulk of the effort has been expended on the
one thing that the school is best fitted to do. Universalists in speech, they have been
for the most part Unitarians in practice.
THE PRESENT POLICY OF MISSOURI NORMAL SCHOOLS — PRESSURE OF LOCAL SITUATION
The real explanation of the announced policy of these schools is complex, but is
not difficult to determine. It is partly traditional. As already indicated, the earliest
programs professed to fit for all positions successively. The schools found that their
graduates, however slightly trained therefor, actually rose to high school and adminis-
trative positions, and they sought to promote this with appropriate courses available
by the way. These were frankly makeshifts to help a teacher climb, say3 from the sev-
enth grade to a high school position. The schools wisely made no pretence at an or-
92 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
ganized curriculum to ensure a teacher fully competent in high school subjects, for
their main stress was elsewhere; they simply did the best they could, and let the low
salaries of the positions justify the inadequacies of preparation. But the "universal"
tradition was started, and the leap from these incidental efforts to four-year college
courses purporting to give an organized training for higher teachers in accordance
with collegiate standards both of curriculum and administration, was made in the dark
without knowledge of what was involved.
EXAMPLE OF OTHEU INSTITUTIONS
Again, the present attitude may be ascribed partly, in some institutions at least, to
a sort of quasi-cornpulsion. It is not easy, in dealing with an undiscriminating public
or a jealous local board, when sister institutions in the same or in neighboring states
are loudly advertising their A.B.'s and B.S.'s, to convince your constituency that such
a course may be undesirable for you. The reproaches, too, from one's professional
colleagues of disloyalty to the normal school "cause" in its "fight with the universi-
ties" are often keen. Warrensburg, altho the largest school, has had until recently al-
most no graduates above the second year of college work. It developed its regular cur-
riculum intensively, and probably would have preferred to wait until longer curricula
could be placed on a thoroughly sound financial basis. At Springfield and Mary ville
this would possibly also be true, had not Kirksville and Cape Girardeau aggressively
asserted the other policy.
EXPANSION A MATTER OF PRIDE
A third contributory motive appears in the following quotations : "It is impossible
to prevent ambitious young teachers from working up from the elementary schools to
the high schools. It is impossible for the normal schools to command the respect of
teachers if their graduates are thus limited.111 "If it were established and understood
that our normal school graduates were not to be accepted as high school teachers nor
considered eligible for small principalships, we should soon see none but the poorest
talent presenting itself for entrance at the doors of these institutions. Strong people
would go elsewhere.""2 If we mistake not, what speaks here is an institutional pride
that balks at the acknowledgment to its patrons that there is anything the institution
cannot do for its students. In so far as this attitude is not one of mere self-aggran-
dizement, the normal schools would seem to be the victims of conditions about thera —
conditions which in turn are fostered and aggravated by the policy of the schools.
Promotion has filled the eye rather than fitness for a given position — the future of the
individual rather than the advantage of the school in which he is to teach. The eco-
nomic situation and the certificate regulations have permitted this, it is true, but it
is none the less deplorable that a student with a minimum of specific preparation for
elementary work should be allowed, thru a series of years, to fill his pockets out of that
1 State Report, 1901, page 53. 2 Ibid,, 1897, pagre 29.
SCOPE OF ORGANIZATION 93
job while he is seeking training for a high school position,, a principalship, or for busi-
ness. The presence of this type of student has enlarged and flattered the institution,
but it has placed it in a false light. Students ostensibly preparing for elementary
work suddenly appear in something wholly different or leave the profession, and the
normal school is directly responsible. An oft-repeated argument in Kirksville cata-
logues in behalf of the four-year college course is that elementary schools need as
well- trained teachers as the high schools — a thesis that all sincere students of edu-
cation have long endorsed. The subtlety of it in this case appears when it is seen that
the school offers no three or four year curricula for elementary work, and that such
graduates uniformly, and the two-year graduates usually or very often, go into small
high schools or into principalships and superintendences, to the palpable satisfaction
of the normal school authorities. Apparent enthusiasm for the downtrodden elemen-
tary school thus eventuates in a college for high school teachers and superintendents.
The almost inescapable danger here is a two- fold mediocrity: a skimped preparation
for elementary teaching and a higher training that cannot be first class. The know-
ledge of this fact is no critic's secret. Student opinion on the point could not be ex-
haustively tested, but in the few cases both at Cape Girardeau and at Kirksville where
opinions were secured, the students, altho in general loyal to the school, felt that its
higher degrees were not desirable. Only one, a Kirksville graduate, felt resentful at
having his A.B. degree from the normal school heavily discounted at the university,
altho he admitted receiving credit at the normal school for five specified courses he
had never taken. One is puzzled to see how u respect" for such training is an asset to
any institution. "Strong people" certainly will go elsewhere under such circumstances,
and only those will remain who fail to grasp the situation, or who by extravagant
rewards of credit, as at Kirksville, are deluded into thinking they can save much time.
On the other hand, we have innumerable instances throughout the country of normal
schools that have set themselves to do a limited task well and which, precisely because
of that fact, are plentifully provided with high grade students. Certain it is that the
only sure way for an institution to deserve the respect even of its own graduates is to
convince them of its integrity and provide them with a training, however limited, of
which they need not be ashamed anywhere.
PERSONAL EXPANSION
There is, however, another phase of this motive, latent in many institutions and
active wherever an ambitious and not over-scrupulous organizer finds a malleable
board and a free field. The motto of this purpose is, "A big institution," behind which
lurks the hoped-for inference, a A big president." The method is first to construct a
"demand" and thereafter to expand the school to meet it. If skilfully undertaken^ a
"demand" may be constructed in a few hours by putting into the mouths of several
patrons or school boards cordial agreement with the far-sighted suggestions of the
president, and presently the whole student body may be discovered by the same method
94 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
to be clamorous for anew department or degree even the not one of them remains to
take it. " Our students demand" or "Many letters from school boards urge" is a flexi-
ble sort of evidence that needs seldom be produced. Of course such "appeals" are "irre-
sistible" and " must be satisfied," the ultimate victims being students usually ignorant
of any other institution and without means of judging the true worth of what they are
getting, students who are flattered by being urged to stay on for "advanced" work.
Nothing is easier than to impose on students in this fashion. The method followed is
to suppress all criticism ; if the school gives a course, it is ipso facto the best course that
can be given in that subject, and ranks with any course by the same name anywhere.
In spite of meagre equipment and their own hesitation, teachers are led to regard it
as a species of disloyalty to suggest to students that they can take advanced work more
profitably at other places. Blind faith in the familiar institution becomes a shibboleth
to young minds. The school literature is an instrument of blatant self-adulation or
bombastic compliment: American schools are "considerably better than those in Eng-
land, Prance, and Germany;" those in the region concerned are "as good as any to be
found anywhere in the world;" the school itself is always a "great" school; its faculty
"represents the training of many great universities," including the "University of
Leipsic and University of Wurzburg;" whereas fewer than half of the teachers have
even bachelor's degrees from a first-class institution, over a quarter having the ques-
tionable degree of the institution itself. As for students, "graduates of eastern univer-
sities come here to school" — this on the strength of a local graduate who had been
East to college and who, returning to his home in the school town for the summer,
registered for a casual course that attracted him. A course in surveying tempts young
men under the guise of "Engineering;" the first essays at animal husbandry parade as
"Thremmatology;" while "Farm Machinery" from a textbook and expounded by a
student just graduated from the school sounds as important and receives as much local
credit as the course at the university given by trained and experienced men in an
extensive laboratory. Meantime the doctrine of "sound scholarship," the "highest
attainable standards," and so on, is set forth with great unction, while "Democracy
in Education" glorifies, and perhaps grimly justifies, the whole.
A decent regard for honesty and justice revolts at this. There is possibly no ob-
jection to a stated supporting an institutional plaything for one individual if it
wishes to do so, but to jeopardize the future of its young students by exposing them
to continued misrepresentation is another matter, A student in a state-supported
institution is entitled at any time to candid and accurate information with regard
to the current value of the work that he is doing, both in individual courses and in
his curriculum as a whole. The curse of the old private educational enterprises lay
in the commercial interest felt by the institution in retaining the student as long as
possible; state education is in a sorry plight if it duplicates the same vice and for
a still more ignoble purpose. It should be the distinctive feature of a state system
that, however much or little it can offer its citizens, it can at least give them reliable
SCOPE OF ORGANIZATION 95
and disinterested counsel. Its schools should make it their first duty to say : "The
instruction that you need is given best at X; we offer it here for those who cannot
go elsewhere, but we lack the proper facilities." They will then beget confidence when
they say: "This other thing we do, so far as we know, as well as it is done anywhere."
A student so counseled not only shapes his career successfully according to national
standards, but has had from both state and institution a priceless lesson in downright
intellectual honesty.
SERVICE OF NORMAL SCHOOLS IN ENFORCING THE IDEA OF PROFESSIONAL TRAINING
Finally, the normal schools have been moved by another consideration which goes
far to justify their whole position. Their contention has been that "there can be no
harmony or unity in the education of a teacher if his scholarship is received in a
college where he is trained to be indifferent to, if not positively antagonistic to, the
pedagogical training that he is expected to get in the normal school."1 The same
writer urges that as colleges and universities will not grant proper credit for work
done in a normal school, "teachers must get their scholarship and their pedagogical
training in the same school." The successful normal school director has seen intensive
professional training for elementary teachers bear remarkable fruit ; he knows that the
graduate of our best normal schools is capable of giving instruction that is amazingly
superior to the teaching of the college graduate who is without professional training.
He knows this to be due to the persistent conservatism of college and university with
regard to scientific education. Therein it is impossible not to agree with him. With
the same skilful selection of teachers, the same discriminating admission of students,
the same careful construction and administration of its curricula, the same thorough
testing and practical training of its candidates, that are now characteristic of the best
training schools for elementary teachers in this country, the teachers college of the
future will" abundantly justify its existence, and will usher, in the really professional
secondary instructor.
CRITICISM BY UNIVERSITIES PARTLY ILL-FOUNDED
The past and present situation, however, deserves further analysis. The reluctance
of higher institutions to accord full recognition to the work done in normal schools
has been of a twofold character: In the first place, they have seriously questioned the
right of the study of education to a place among other accepted subjects of scientific
instruction and research; in the second place, they have questioned whether individ-
ual normal schools were conducting that study in a fashion entitled to the credit of
which the subject itself might be worthy. In so far as this hesitation has been sincere
and not the result of prejudice or institutional feeling, it has been wholly proper*
The first objection has borne with equal weight on departments of education within
the colleges and universities themselves, and has not yet wholly disappeared. It has
1 State Report, 1901, page 171,
96 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
compelled the newcomer to fight for his place, and has thereby required him to refine
and improve the organization of his subject in order to defend it against concentrated
criticism. It has but repeated the history of every new claimant for academic approval,
that, for example, of the study of science or history, or, more recently, sociology. In
all essential respects, however, this fight for admission has now been won. The depart-
ment or school of education has achieved freedom and dignity in an ever increasing
number of higher institutions. Moreover, the work done by good normal schools shows
marked similarity in spirit arid method to that performed in college and university
centres. The ideals of the profession, and of professional training, as now set forth
by the best representatives of both types of institution are virtually identical.
The second objection, however productive of bitter and often justifiable resentment,
was also inevitable. It should be remembered that at the date of the quotation cited
above (1901), the Missouri normal schools were, by their own admission, little more
than high schools; they admitted students at the age of fifteen practically from the
elementary school; it was yet three years before their advanced curriculum was made
even nominally to parallel lower class college work. Surely any wise college adminis-
trator would think twice before allowing full value to untested transitional credit of
this sort. Add to this the later administrative practices, such as those at Kirksville,
that would admit astudent at thirteen, allowing him at fourteen to begin earningucol-
lege" credit, and to keep " college" and high school work parallel for from two to five
years, and any self-respecting college would reject the entire institution at once.
It is true, however, that all along much excellent work has been done for which
credit in other institutions could not be secured. The spectacle is instructive: six
wholly autonomous state institutions doing to a certain extent the same work, each
standing on its rights and dignity and keeping the others at bay for a dozen years,
simply because there was no agency that could step in, investigate the trouble, and
secure an understanding ! The institutional spirit of fifteen years ago was not the
cooperative spirit of to-day. "The longest pole gets the persimmons'" was the univer-
sity's reply to one normal school president when seeking an agreement, and general
competition was the result. Under these circumstances, the normal schools took the
surest way to forfeit the confidence of their more advanced rivals. Subject to no inspec-
tion or critical review, they begged the question in the easiest manner by claiming
to do everything, and thereby made a pedagogical blunder that retarded their cause
and the reputation of professional training as much certainly as the conservatism of
the university ever did. If, while agitating vigorously, they had first pushed for high,
intensive excellence in their regular work, matching or surpassing therein the college
when measured by its own standards, and had then slowly added what they could
fully maintain, the past decade of their inter-institutional relations would have been
totally different. Instead, the catalogues reverberated with proposals that every one
knew had no basis either in suitable instructors or in necessary appropriations, to say
nothing of students; meanwhile the change in policy and the new emphasis which
SCOPE OF ORGANIZATION 97
was attempted could not fail to Injure the relatively less advanced work which the
schools were obliged to maintain.
These efforts at expansion have been unfortunate for another reason. Normal
schools, unlike law or medical schools,, profess to stand primarily for the processes of
sound education in general, and to reveal by precept incorporated into practice the
true morality and economy of mental growth; when a normal school or school of edu-
cation sacrifices this honor, it abandons its most precious and characteristic trust.
THE SCOPE OF AN INSTITUTION'S WORK SHOULD BE DETERMINED IN VIEW OF ALL THE FACTS
If the above analysis is correct ; if the normal schools have too lightly undertaken
a serious responsibility because others would not meet it properly, or because they
themselves sought the prestige involved, or because they regarded it as their tra-
ditional right, or because other normal schools were expanding, the inference is not
that normal schools should not enlarge their scope. To be sure, none of these grounds,
except possibly the first, can be considered valid. If training for high school teachers
is not well given elsewhere, it is by all means the duty of the normal schools to agi-
tate and, if necessary, to appeal for funds sufficient to enable them to do the work in
a suitable manner themselves.
There may be other valid grounds. Whether there are or not is the third problem
that confronts a school, after it has determined what standard training is and what
surplus funds, if any, it has for extension. These latter questions concern each school
alone; but the problems of functional enlargement, restriction, or readjustment are
matters that can be properly determined only in cooperation, as they depend wholly
on the needs of the state viewed in the light of the performance of all of its agencies
taken together.
Cooperation of the sort here contemplated demands a definite, intelligent, and re-
sponsible procedure. Here, for example, is a school that has never given a four-year
degree, but has administered two-year curricula excellently. Shall the president, emu-
lating the example of others, get together by hook or by crook a group of three or
four students whom he can persuade to stay thru in order to give the school the mys-
tic blessing of a "four-year class"? We have already seen the kind of fraud on the
student that such an attempt may perpetrate. Or shall he be required to take his pro-
posal before his colleagues, say a board consisting of the heads of normal schools and
of the university school of education together with the state superintendent? Shall he
be asked to show why his candidates would not be much better off, both as individ-
uals and as eventual servants of the state, at another normal school already doing
acceptable four-year work, or at the university? If, after prolonged and thorough in-
vestigation by this group, it became plain that the university and four other insti-
tutions with organized standard four-year curricula were unable to supply the de-
mand, and that there was the prospect of substantial attendance on such work in the
fifth school, this executive could have the support of tested and trustworthy evidence
98 PURPOSE OF A NORMAL SCHOOL
in asking funds to establish his new curriculum in a proper way. Anything short of
such carefully considered action is a failure in educational planning.
ORGANIZATION OF CRITICISM NEEDED
There is no limit to which the continual joint expert study of this functional growth
and readjustment should proceed. It is far more important than the unification of
material administration thru a single board, altho undoubtedly it would be much
facilitated thereby. The executive heads of these institutions are the staters selected
agents for dealing with its teacher supply. The latter is a growing, shifting, never
ending problem quite beyond the successful grasp of laymen. The logical and neces-
sary thing is to require these gentlemen as a single body to regard the state's problem
as their own in its entirety, and not, as at present, as a districted problem which each
may dispose of at will. In this manner each president should become, in a way, presi-
dent of the whole, and see his particular institution as part of the whole organism.1
1 See page 66.
VI
PERSONNEL OF THE MISSOURI NORMAL SCHOOLS
A. TEACHERS1
AGE, SEX, AND PARENTAGE
IN Its five normal schools the state maintains some two hundred instructors. Nearly
one- half are women. Two-thirds are under forty years of age, the median age of the
women — thirty-three — being some five years less than that of the men. About two-
thirds also are of American parentage, and nearly one-half were born in Missouri. Of
the men two- thirds came from agricultural, one-sixth from professional, and one-tenth
from commercial families. Of the parents of the women one- third were engaged in
trade, slightly less than one-third in agriculture, and one-fifth in professions.
EDUCATIONAL EQUIPMENT
Concerning the education and experience that may be determining elements in a
teacher's success, only the more general facts, such as institutional attendance, de-
grees, and years of various kinds of experience, are statistically measurable. These are,
however, most suggestive. In the case of an occasional individual they may be mis-
leading; some unschooled genius may tower in ability above a man with many de-
grees. Nevertheless, other things being equal, twenty college graduates are practically
certain to excel any similar group composed of those who have graduated from high
school only. Moreover, such facts become increasingly trustworthy the larger the
group.
Remembering how home environment affects the choice of a profession, it is inter-
esting to find that four-fifths of the men and about seven-tenths of the women who
teach in the normal schools of Missouri come from families that include other teach-
ers.2 As the same thing is true, altho to a smaller degree, of the state university and
college teachers, and also of prospective teachers now in the normal schools,3 with
the exception of Harris Teachers College at St. Louis, one appears to be dealing here
with a distinct vocational characteristic, — families that already include teachers are
likely to provide others ; teachers in general represent families to which school affairs
are more or less familiar.
SECONDARY AND HIGHER TRAINING — DEGREES
Secondary education in one form or another has, of course, been completed by all
normal school teachers. Two-thirds received their training in the public high schools;
nearly one-sixth received their secondary training either wholly or in great part in
academies or in the secondary departments of normal schools or of small colleges; and
the remaining sixth experienced various combinations of such schools.
1 For a description of the data upon which the statements in this section are based, see pages 401, 402.
2 See page 419. a See page 432.
100 PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
Higher education is recorded chiefly in the number, kind, and source of the degrees
received. Twenty -nine per cent of the teachers have no four-year degrees, the propor-
tion varying from fifteen per cent at Kirksville1 to forty per cent at Springfield and
Maryville. Of the teachers who lack degrees, one-fourth give no record of work be-
yond the high school, somewhat more claim three or more years of such work, while
nearly half claim two years or less. The departmental assignment of the teachers hav-
ing no degree is of interest. More than half — thirty-two out of fifty-eight — were
teachers of art, music, physical education, or commercial subjects. The lack of a de-
gree in such cases is easily explained, altho perhaps its justification is not so simple.
Those who instruct students of college grade should themselves have had college
training. But seven teachers without degrees were teaching academic subjects, chiefly
language; eleven2 were engaged in supervision of practice teaching, and eight in giv-
ing courses in education.
This reflects a characteristic weakness of the normal schools. One would expect these
schools to require, even for their teachers of arithmetic and grammar, at least as well-
trained teachers as are demanded by good high schools. This indeed has been the
tendency. But while the academic departments have been steadily strengthened bv
better formal preparation, the professional and supervisory departments have been
conducted more largely on the basis of experience unsupported by theoretical train-
ing. Nor is it a question of elderly teachers inherited from an old regime;, the me-
dian age of these deficient teachers is thirty-three. It is certainly unfortunate that
eleven out of the fifteen teachers in all the schools who were responsible for the criti-
cal task of directing the candidate^ first practical efforts in teaching, and that eight
of the thirty-three teachers giving professional courses possessed an academic train-
ing inferior to that of some of their students. These are the departments of all others
where it would seem fitting for a normal school to lay stress upon something more
than an empirical attitude toward " method." Supervisors of practice teaching should
be among the best trained people on the staff, both in theory and in practice, if a
normal school is to justify reasonable expectations, and instructors in professional
courses should manifestly outrank all others in equipment and ability. Students
seriously expecting to teach feel instinctively that practice courses constitute their
most indispensable work; and the schools will not measure up to their responsibility
until they place the most competent and best paid instructors in this department.
As a justification for partly schooled instructors it is weakly urged that mere de-
grees or years of attendance at institutions are no- proof of ability to train teachers,
and individual cases have been effectively cited to support this contention. Such ar-
gument is no refutation of the fact that a thorough education is an indispensable basis
1 It should be explained, however, that Kirksville prpvides degrees of its own for many of its degreeless teachers
while they are drawing full salary as instructors. In the faculty of 1915 six, or thirteen per cent, had received such
degrees without resident work. Omitting these, twenty-eight per cent lack degrees —about the same proportion as
at Warrensburg and Cape Girardeau.
2 Fourteen, if the Kirksville degrees above referred to be omitted.
TEACHERS 101
for success in any grade of professional instruction, and that education can be best
ensured at good institutions. Further, the requirement of a degree is some safeguard
against a lackadaisical habit of many teachers who are always professing to study >
but who never carry their work to a successful conclusion. That these facts have been
openly or tacitly recognized at the institutions themselves is shown by the steadily
increasing emphasis upon a satisfactory institutional qualification for appointment.
DEGREES CLASSIFIED
The teachers who have degrees representing four or more years of study beyond
the high school have been classified1 to show not only the number of those holding the
various degrees, but also, in a rough way, the quality of the degrees held. For this pur-
pose use has been made of the classification of institutions formulated by Dr. K. C.
Babcock for the United States Bureau of Education in 1911.2 Whatever the merits
or defects of this classification, it at least treats all schools measured by it alike, and
the results secured by applying it, as has been done here, to the state university and to
a good St. Louis high school, are of interest. Seventy-one per cent of all normal school
teachers hold four-year bachelor's degrees, as compared with ninety-two per cent
holding such degrees in the university and eighty-two per cent in the Soldan High
School. Only thirty-nine per cent of the normal school teachers hold their bachelor's
degrees from first class institutions as compared with seventy-four per cent at the
university and sixty-five per cent at the Soldan High School.
The situation in the individual schools may be traced at will; Cape Girardeau heads
the list with forty-eight per cent of its staff equipped with first class bachelor's de-
grees. If only the various kinds of degrees be considered, regardless of duplication,
Maryville leads with eighty-three per cent of all degrees in classes one and two. Mary-
ville also has the highest percentage of advanced degrees, all of them but one from
first class institutions; yet in the proportion of the faculty having any degree it is
low. Kirksville is lowest by this analysis, having sixty-nine per cent of all of its de-
grees in the first two classes; its advanced degrees are all from high grade schools.
In the proportion of first class degrees of all kinds the figures run from forty- two per
cent at Springfield to seventy-five per cent at Cape Girardeau — five per cent below
the Soldan High School at St Louis!
It may be urged that the quality of an institution is no certain guarantee of the
quality of the individual who goes thru it, and in the case of any single individual this
will be freely admitted. It is not true, nevertheless, that, other things being equal, fifty
graduates of inferior institutions will represent a training that approaches that of fifty
1 See page 420.
* This is substantially the classification later adopted by the Association of American Universities. Class I includes
institutions of such grade that their graduates would generally suffer no loss of time by transfer to admittedly
standard institutions (Columbia, Harvard, Yale, etc.); Class II includes schools .whose average graduates would
transfer to such institutions with the loss of part of a year; Class III indicates a loss of one full year, and Class IV
of practically two years. Class V comprises all other schools and includes the four-year courses of the Missouri
normal schools.
102 PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
graduates of first class colleges. The low grade school, thru its inferior selection of ma-
terial, its weaker faculty and equipment, and its looser tension of intellectual perform-
ance, exercises an influence that only the exceptional student will overcome. The gradu-
ates of such schools may perform a devoted and worthy work, but when the institutions
so served place themselves in competition with other institutions, this point assumes
importance. There can be but one conclusion respecting the normal schools in this
regard: they are weak.
GEOGRAPHY OF TRAINING
Not only the rating but the location of the institutions that serve as a given
school's intellectual progenitors is significant. There is a marked difference between
the institution where, by inheritance, the limited ideas and attitudes of that partic-
ular institution or locality prevail, and the school that invites and provides for a
generous renewal and invigoration of its mental life by accessions from abroad. Cer-
tain inferences on this point may be drawn from the facts before us. Including the
four-year degrees from normal schools, fifty-five per cent of the bachelor's degrees
held by normal school teachers were from Missouri schools, as were also over two-
fifths of the advanced degrees. The university issued one-fourth of the first and nearly
one-third of the second.1 The women teachers are far behind the men in amount of
graduate work done, and do a much larger share of it in Missouri. The individual
schools vary greatly. Maryville has but one Missouri normal school degree, while
nearly a third of the Kirksville bachelor's degrees are such. Most of the graduate
degrees held at Maryville, also, were taken outside the state, while at Springfield
they are largely from Missouri. It is perhaps noteworthy that at Kirksville and Cape
Girardeau, the two schools at which competition with the university has been most
in evidence, much of the graduate work of the instructors has been done at the uni-
versity; at Kirksville this is true to the extent of sixty-four per cent.
The institutions outside of Missouri most frequented by normal school teachers for
various degrees were University of Chicago, Columbia University, Brown University,
and the universities of Michigan, Indiana, Kansas, and Wisconsin.2
COMBINATIONS OF TRAINING
Prom a purely institutional point of view the variety of mental background to be
found in the faculty of a normal school appears in the combinations of training. A
table3 of these data unravels certain strands of influence in a suggestive manner. The
mode — one-third — among women teachers includes normal school with college train-
ing; while the mode among men teachers — thirty per cent — shows college and grad-
uate work only. As the men are more frequently heads of departments, directors of
training, and so forth, this largest single combination in their training is noteworthy,
1 Half of the bachelor's degrees from Missouri schools came from the university and nearly one-fourth from the
normal schools.
2 See page 422. * See page 422,
TEACHERS 103
and indicates how closely the university and the normal schools have interacted. The
table shows a further fact: whereas the university has developed a fairly homogeneous
form of training for its teachers, the normal school corps is drawn from a wide series
of combinations; seventy-four per cent of the university teachers have one sequence
of educational experience, namely, high school, college, and graduate work, while the
largest group of normal school instructors having the same kind of training contains
but twenty-three per cent of the whole number. This same wide variation appears also
in the experience of the two sets of teachers.
Altho all members of a normal school staff, both those native to the state and new-
comers from without, may be expected to acquaint themselves with the school con-
ditions into which their students are going as teachers, it is doubtless commendable
that a considerable proportion should have that knowledge bred in the bone thru per-
sonal experience. For the good of the school, however, natives of the state who have
passed thru its elementary and secondary system should include in their college or
university training a considerable period of work amid other surroundings. For this a
summer session elsewhere is not enough. Where such migration does not occur there
is certain danger. Forty per cent of the normal school teachers had both their second-
ary and higher work in Missouri, while thirty-two per cent were native born and had
not left the state previous to receiving their first degree. This proportion does not
appear excessive.
GRADUATE DEGREES
Only about one-fourth of the teachers in Missouri normal schools had ever done
recognized study beyond a college course, altho nearly all of them were giving collegi-
ate instruction. Of fifty-two master's degrees, forty- two came from first class institu-
tions; twenty-two were takeji in Missouri, sixteen of them at the university. Of the
degrees usually considered as necessary to qualify a teacher to give collegiate instruc-
tion, there are seven among the one hundred ninety-nine teachers and officers, six
of them taken from first class institutions, all outside of the state.
RETARDATION IN TRAINING-
The retardation of normal school teachers in securing their education deserves spe-
cial attention. The records of the group show that sixty-eight, or just under half, of
all the four-year bachelor's degrees with date given were taken after the age of twenty-
five. Allowing thus three years beyond the normal age of twenty- two as a reasonable
margin, forty-seven per cent of the women and fifty- six per cent of the men were
belated. Eleven of the twenty-one teachers who have only the two-year Ped.B. degree
were belated in getting it. The interpretation of this situation may be aided by com-
paring similar figures at the university, where eighty-four per cent of all bachelor's
degrees were taken at the age of twenty-five or under. At the normal schools thirty-
six per cent of these degrees were taken at the age of twenty-nine or later, whereas
104 PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
at the university only about six per cent were taken so late.1 When the ages at which
the degrees were taken are examined in connection with the class of institution that
granted them, the following facts appear: Altho earning nearly half of the total num-
ber of bachelor's degrees on time, the normal school teachers have earned fifty-eight
per cent of their low grade degrees and but thirty-nine per cent of their first class
degrees at the age of twenty -five or before. That is, the poorer degrees come easily
and at an early age, while the standard degrees corne later.2 Among the teachers at
the university, altho eighty-nine per cent of the twenty-eight3 low grade degrees
were earned on time, eighty-three per cent of the one hundred ten first class degrees
were likewise obtained at the age of twenty -five or earlier.
It will, of course, be suggested that, in a normal school instructor who has spent a
longer or shorter interval before or between his college years in teaching, belatedness
is a virtue, whatever may be the case with college teachers. The theory is that the
maturer student who has taught derives more benefit from Ms college work, particu-
larly as a prospective teacher ; his trial efforts have revealed the difficulties of teach-
ing, have focused his attention and appreciation, and have sharpened his motive. There
can be no doubt of this — to an extent. There is danger, however, lest maturity of grasp
of mere college work be reckoned too much to the advantage of the individual, while
the loss of momentum and point of view favorable to advanced study and gained by
fairly early education is ignored. It seems hardly open to question that beyond a cer-
tain point delay serves simply as a brake; that possessing a college education at the age
of twenty-four, a student normally makes more intelligent use of the years to thirty,
and arrives there ahead of the belated college student graduating at that age. Much
preliminary and unsupervised experience will prove to be a waste of time if not a posi-
tive injury. Such would undoubtedly be the attitude of medical men toward practical
medical experience before theoretical medical training. There is a difference here only
in degree. Professional training in education is rapidly achieving the power to make
the tyro in teaching appear quite as much of a bungler as is the novice in medicine.
In both professions a littl.e unskilled experience is probably of use to the practitioner
in raising and defining problems for future solution ; but the time speedily comes when
delay in obtaining further education is a loss. Such delay is prohibited in medicine
for the sake of the patients and should be prevented in education for the same reason.
RETARDATION AND GRADUATE WORK
We are dealing here with prospective normal school instructors, all of whom must
be expected to have done graduate work. The Missouri conference agreement now
1 The schools themselves vary considerably in this particular. Cape Girardeau leads with 62 per cent of her teachers*
bachelor's degrees taken on time; the other schools take the following order: Springrfield, 52 per cent; Warrens-
bur??, 48 per cent ; Kirksville, 38 per cent; and Maryville, 36 per cent.
2 Here, likewise, the schools show a marked difference, but are consistent in their relative tendency in. every case
except Maryville: teachers at Cape Girardeau earned 88 per cent low grade, but only 55 per cent first class degrees
on time; at Warrensburgr, 67 per cent and 85 per cent; at Springfield, 67 per cent and 86 per cent; at Kirksville, 50
per cent and 26 per cent; and at Maryville, the one exception in sequence, 29 per cent and 43 per cent.
8 Low class degrees were counted only when no first class bachelor's degree was held.
TEACHERS 105
calls for the master's degree as the standard evidence of qualification to teach in a
normal school, but that can be considered only as transitional; there is no reason
why the preparation implied in the doctor's degree should not be required of normal
school teachers as well as of college teachers, if they propose to do coordinate work,
and if appropriate forms of such professional preparation are now available, as is
the case. It is of interest, therefore, to discover what relation, if any, exists between
belated graduation and post-graduate work. It may first be noted that the master's
degrees taken by teachers in the normal schools are taken late: slightly more than
half of those who hold such degrees and gave record of their ages took their de-
grees at the age of twenty-nine or later, while at the university but nineteen per
cent had reached that age. If now we examine the ages at which those who went on
for graduate work took their bachelor's degrees, we find that sixty -two per cent were
twenty-five years of age or under, while of the group that did not go on, only thirty-
nine per cent took their bachelor's degrees on time. This seems significant. It would
fairly describe the tendency to say that in general the student who of necessity post-
pones his college course finds it exhausting, completes it out of breath, and has less
ambition and energy for the advanced study which is to be his all-important profes-
sional equipment.
Judging from the available data, therefore, as well as from the analogy of other
professions, the effectively trained teacher would be the naturally gifted man or woman
who has secured his formal training early in a high grade institution and who, after
a limited amount of successful experience under competent direction, has taken two
or three years of graduate work. Such a man or woman is ready at the age of twenty -
seven or twenty-eight, with a sound and comprehensive intellectual equipment, to
begin a career as teacher, administrator, or expert in educational research. It is to
this type of teacher, further tested by experience and achievement, that we must look
to give instruction in the training institutions of this country.
EXPERIENCE
After formal training, the most important element in fitness to train teachers is
likely to be the duration and character of preliminary experience. It is reasonable
to assume that each type of professional training has a type of experience best suited
to ensure its highest efficiency. In the preparation of teachers this would appear
obvious enough: a person can scarcely hope to qualify as a guide for teachers of
children in public schools without first-hand and continuous experience with the con-
ditions and problems which he is fitting his students to face. As a counsel of perfec-
tion such a principle would appear to hold good throughout a training-school staff;
in actual practice there are some positions, those for example in certain special sub-
jects or even in highly specialized forms of subject-matter, where such experience may
be dispensed with. It is unquestionably true, however, that any institution bent on
closing the gap between its "professional" and "academic" work, and desirous of in-
106 PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
fusing a single fixed and all-pervading purpose into its operations, will look first of
all to its faculty. The thing cannot be done unless every teacher has himself had
sufficient teaching experience of the particular kind in question to determine the pat-
tern of every course he gives. There is no such thing as teaching in general, and teach-
ing in particular is highly specific. We should expect two hundred well -trained normal
school teachers to exhibit a large amount of preparatory experience,
The Missouri teachers have had experience; whether it is of the appropriate kind
may not be so clear. In total years of teaching experience,1 the normal school teachers
and the teachers in the private colleges rank together; the median is twelve. The me-
dian at the state university is nine, and at the junior colleges, six.
KIND OF EXPERIENCE
Altho their total experience runs very high, the normal school teachers have a me-
dian tenure in their present institutions of but four years as compared with five at the
state university and between six and seven at Washington University. Their experi-
ence has been of a somewhat different sort, as further analysis shows. Altho two-fifths
have had less than five years experience in any higher institution, nine-tenths of them
have had experience in elementary or secondary teaching- The meaning of this fact
stands out clearly when comparison is made with the other great teacher-training body
In the state— the university, where fifty-six per cent of all who instinct prospective
teachers of boys and girls have had no experience in teaching outside of college or uni-
versity. It becomes still more significant when compared with the English training
colleges for teachers, where the instructors have had practically no experience in the
schools for which they are preparing teachers, and where, as a result, the training
colleges are completely out of touch with the lower schools. There can be no doubt
that the principle of selection on the basis of experience which our American normal
schools have applied in a general way to the choice of their teachers is a considerable
virtue that should be conserved as the training of these teachers is strengthened in its
theoretical aspects. Experience should be more definitely required and more closely
scrutinized as to its quality. Slightly more than one-fourth of the teachers in Mis-
souri normal schools lack elementary school experience; yet they are training chiefly
elementary school teachers. One-fourth have been superintendents — a position that
has usually included secondary and occasionally elementary instruction. Sixty- three
per cent have taught in high school, while twenty-one per cent have had some expe-
rience in college or university instruction. Over one-half have taught in rural schools,
altho in this qualification, as in others, there appears a sharp difference in favor of
the men.
Such an array of preparatory field service would seem greatly to enrich the in-
struction until we discover that there is no well-ordered relation between the expe-
1 See pa#e 422.
TEACHEKS 107
rience and the present occupation : that former high school teachers of English and
history are now showing students how to teach arithmetic and geography to sixth
grade children; that courses in school administration are given by teachers who have
had no adequate experience even in supervision ; and that former principals and su-
perintendents are now teaching Latin and sociology. In other words, the particular
kind of experience, instead of furnishing an all-important background for the present
purpose of instruction, is largely unrelated; teachers have in very many cases received
their present appointments as promotion out of educational jobs of different sorts and
not because of distinguished excellence in the kind of teaching for which they are
now asked to prepare students. It is plain that the close contact between the normal
school and the public school, fortunate as it is, is rather the chance of evolution than
the conscious recognition of a sound principle. To secure the latter it should be re-
quired that in addition to a good general education and specific training in his field,
every normal school instructor should have had likewise a reasonable amount of spe-
cific experience in doing the thing for which he undertakes to train others.1 This
would maintain a fine tradition in its most effective form.
TEACHING ASSIGNMENT
The natural correlative of training and experience is to be found in the teacher's
present occupation and the conditions attending its pursuit. The latter include many
phases of administration which will be dealt with in connection with that topic ;
the aspects having particular significance here are those involving the scope and
weight of the assignment. An examination of the teaching programs of 1915-16 shows
that eighteen per cent of all teachers in Missouri normal schools teach more than
one subject. Forty-two instances occur among the teachers of the regular session and
fourteen among those teaching only in the summer. They are about evenly distributed
among the schools, and in all but ten instances involve so-called "college" work. Cer-
tain subjects, such as education and psychology, especially educational psychology,
physics and general science, history and economics, have a natural affinity, and, even
as college instruction, might conceivably be well handled by the same teachers. Other
combinations are allowable enough in a high school, but are suspicious when offered
for college credit. Spanish is combined with German, with history, and with photog-
raphy ; German is offered further by a teacher of Latin and a teacher of French. Physics
teachers teach also mathematics and chemistry; history teachers teach Latin, mathe-
matics, and geography. Teachers of education teach geography and chemistry, and a
teacher of English teaches sociology. Nine teachers in the regular session have a com-
bination of three subjects. As one might surmise, three of these teach education; one
i An admirable instance of the successful enforcement of a policy of selecting experience for a present purpose
is shown in the staff of the St. Louis high schools. It is desired to have teachers with experience m elementary in-
struction, in order to ensure a true perspective in high school work. In 1915 over sixty per cent of the teachers m
the Soldan High School were thus equipped, the remainder, with occasional exceptions, having* only hiffh school
experience. If an incidental advantage can fee secured to this extent in a higrh school, a normal school should hold
out stubbornly for a requisite that is essential.
108 PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
combines it with English and geography, and two with history and mathematics.
Chemistry combines once with physics and mathematics, once with bacteriology and
general science, and once with physics and physiology. One teacher gives instruction
in French, German, and Spanish. To call such work " college" work is probably un-
justifiable in most cases. It is impossible to expect a collegiate grade of work from
an individual who must teach five classes per day in two or more distinct fields, and
teachers who are properly trained will refuse to do it. Injustice to the normal schools
it must be said that such cases represent a past condition that is fast being outgrown,
as is shown by the fact that eighty -two per cent of all their instructors are now work-
ing in single departments. The chief mistake has been in the assertion of claims for
collegiate recognition during recent years when conditions were admittedly much
worse than they are to-day.
LENGTH OF PROG HAM
Of even greater absolute importance than the diversity of assignment in determin-
ing the quality of work is the teacher's time schedule. The most striking feature of
the teachers' quarterly programs in 1915-16 is the wide variation among the schools,1
In summer nearly three-fifths of the teachers at Cape Girardeau gave from twelve to
nineteen periods of instruction per week, while at Springfield only three per cent gave
so little. Sixty -seven per cent at Springfield had twenty-five or more periods as com-
pared with four per cent at Cape Girardeau, and six individuals at Springfield had
thirty periods or more. How can work done under such dissimilar conditions be com-
pared? Similarly at Warrensburg over half of the programs in the regular session
called for from twenty-five to thirty-five periods weekly, while Kirks ville asked but one
teacher to exceed twenty -four periods and but three to exceed twenty. Yet no similar
variation in salary occurred; in fact, the teachers at Cape Girardeau, while having
much shorter programs, received on the average higher salaries than the teachers at
Springfield. There could be no more forcible argument for the need of some regulat-
ing authority to establish for all the schools a common schedule according to some
well-considered standard*
A second fact that stands out is the marked increase of load during the summer ses-
sion. Twice as great a proportion of teachers were carrying from twenty-five to thirty-
five periods in the summer term as did so during the regular session; the percentage
of all summer term teachers carrying such programs was forty-two. If summer work
involved simply a high tho possible maximum based on a reasonable and compensat-
ing minimum for the regular session, the case would be different. As it is, every such
program is super-maximum. No normal school instructor professing to do collegiate
work should be allowed to teach twenty-five class-periods per week at any time: the
fact itself brands the quality of the work as necessarily inferior. When the inrush of
summer students is permitted to create such schedules, there can be but one result:
1 See page 425.
TEACHERS 109
the work degenerates into a genial and superficial formalism of little value; the school
gyrates thru the summer on the momentum of the good work done in the regular
session, and is obliged to recover its balance in the fall. The extraordinary industry
of the summer attendants helps to overcome the evil, but the effect on the faculty
is exhausting. This judgment is fully corroborated by impressions received during
visits at the schools, especially at Springfield. The teachers dread the summer terra
and discredit the work done under such conditions. When the same situation prevails
throughout the year, comment is of course needless.
WHAT is A REASONABLE LOAD?
There is certainly no single or arbitrary rule by which a reasonable standard of
amount of work for normal school instructors may be determined. It would seem to
be closely involved with two main factors : the capacity of the instructors and the
quality of work desired. No one would propose to turn a high school staff into a college
faculty by reducing the weekly load from twenty -five periods to twelve. The average
high school teacher would scarcely know what to do with the time; he has a general-
ized training with or without special emphasis in one or two fields; he has a distinctly
routine attitude toward instruction, and to him the physical burden of twenty-five
periods is not excessive. In some high schools, where specialized graduate work is now
required of teachers, instruction tends to assume a fresher, more intense, and vital
form; here, therefore, appears also the tendency to shorten hours to fit the better
type of teacher, not because he can compel it, but because he has the ability and train-
ing to make his four hours a day worth another's five. Similarly the good college in-
structor is expected, thru complete familiarity with his subject, to give his material
an original and vigorous treatment. This he cannot usually do save in a single field
or portion thereof, and he must live with his sources in their best forms to the point
of saturation. To such an instructor more than three periods of instruction per day is
a drain which his study time fails properly to replenish. He must keep abreast of the
development of his subject, must continually revise his courses, and must himself do
constructive study. For the sake of his product it is usually well worth while to give
him time for all of this.
Assuming a faculty trained to high grade work, the question of schedule becomes
a question of the quality of work desired. There is an impression that a heavy schedule
is merely a burden to the teacher; that he continues somehow to produce in larger
amount the best of which he is capable. This is of course a mistake. A school demand-
ing that a teacher give twenty-five periods of collegiate instruction per week simply
gets that teacher's energy and effort spread out thinly over twenty-five periods in-
stead of concentrated into fifteen, and each class suffers accordingly. It is difficult to
make the average school board or layman understand this; to them an instructor
teaching thirty periods is obviously twice as valuable as the one teaching half that
time. To any one who knows what college work is, however, it is apparent that the
110 PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
institution that professes to do college work on such a basis is seriously deceiving
both itself and others.
In view of these two considerations, the situation in Missouri normal schools sug-
gests certain comments. When studied for the purpose of evaluating claims to colle-
giate recognition, the schools would appear to have failed to realize the terms on which
such recognition could justly be based. The levels of work to which each instructor
is assigned are so varied that nearly all cases of excessive program involve some col-
lege work and several are exclusively collegiate.1 The length of period in the normal
schools is the same approximately as at the university.2 There is no apparent reason
why the same standards should not be applied. As evidence that they can be success-
fully applied, the example of Harris Teachers College at St. Louis may be cited. Here,
in an institution offering two years only of collegiate work, no teacher's schedule calls
for more than fifteen hours, and the average is considerably lower.
It is probable, however, that a standard college schedule should not be applied
abruptly to the normal schools, except for such teachers as are already trained college
workers. There is on the faculty of each school a considerable number of teachers of
the high school type; men and women lacking special training and bred by long use
to the old style normal school program.3 Some of these are good teachers who might
yet acquire adequate preparation, or who would at least be acceptable instructors
in secondary subjects. On the other hand, in so far as the schools attempt college
work, the present little group of well-prepared teachers should at once be enlarged
and placed on a strictly collegiate basis in respect to hours and subjects. A training
school for teachers, of all institutions, ought to make its own standai'ds in these
respects unimpeachable.4
GOOD TEACHING AS EXACTING AS RESEARCH
There is a feeling on the part of some that the function of a training-school staff
should not involve research, bub should consist exclusively in inculcating known
truth, and that consequently a fuller teaching program is permissible. The premise
1 Out of one hundred twenty-eight programs in academic and professional subjects, eighty-six, or sixty-seven per
cent, show ten. or more periods each of college work ; nineteen programs are wholly collegiate, and only sixteen are
wholly secondary. It is urged at Springfield that secondary normal school work should count on a twenty-five period
basis as ordinary high school work. But Springfield also avers that its two terms of geometry and of history are
worth three in the high school because of its "college" teachers and mature students!
3 When these statistics were gathered, the normal schools were operating- in general on a fifty-minute period ;
Kirksville lengthened some periods to fifty-five minutes, and Spring-field and Maryville reduced some to forty-five
minutes. Such differences are of little importance in defence of the conditions described. When once adjusted to a
student-group and prepared to meet it, a teacher welcomes a longer hour; it is the number of such readjuHtments
that counts. The longer interval between classes at the university as compared with exchange of classes within
a single building tends to equalize the periods still further.
3 It was interesting, and often amusing, to observe in personal interviews with teachers how naively this point of
view was betrayed. Not a few who were teaching " college n classes twenty or twenty-five periods per week — a pro-
gram that would rightfully stagger a mind that understood what it meant— spoke glibly of their enjoyment of it.
It appeared to challenge their idea of a good day's work to stand before a class for as many hours as once they had
kept a country school. It is needless to say that their instruction was of the corresponding type.
* Since the data on which this study was based were secured, an agreement between the state university and the
normal schools stipulates a maximum teaching program of eighteen hours weekly, To what extent this provision
has been enforced and the nature of its effects have not been ascertained. It is an obviously proper arrangement.
TEACHERS 111
back of this attitude is partially true, but the conclusion is wholly mistaken. Techni-
cal research in education requiring minute and prolonged experimentation is doubt-
less out of place in a training school under present conditions, altho this may be said
only with the proviso that these schools be kept in intimate touch with such work
even to the extent of limited participation. It is not too much to expect that some
one serious undertaking of a research nature should be under way at every normal
school all of the time. But the heart of the job in an institution for preparing teach-
ers is unquestionably the teaching itself. The foremost feature of a successful school
of this type, the lever on which it must chiefly depend to accomplish its results, is the
ability of each and every instructor to present continuously the performance of the
finished artist in teaching as teaching. It is contact of this sort that soonest and most
deeply fastens fine ideals of teaching in the minds of young students. This ability in
a teacher is not the ability required to prepare books or to conduct general investi-
gations. It presupposes rather a constant and sympathetic intimacy with the kind
of instruction for which the teacher is preparing others; it develops a more and
more sensitive insight into the needs of students and the ways of winning access to
them; and, finally, it commands an inexhaustible fund of human interest and per-
sonal force that by common consent justifies the name "teacher" in the greater sense*
All of this means devoted thought and a lavish expenditure of power. To teach teach-
ers is of necessity a work lightly undertaken by many, since a multitude must under-
take it; but to teach teachers well is the most exacting and responsible as it is per-
haps the most inspiring business in the academic world. While, therefore, much more
must be demanded of the normal school instructor than he usually gives to-day, he
should in turn be protected, even more than his colleague in the university, from
requirements that check his growth and stifle his best expression.
PRODUCTIVE SCHOLAESHIP
For the reasons just indicated one may hardly expect to find in a group of normal
school teachers that productiveness for publication which is properly characteristic
of teachers in a good college or university. Fifteen bound volumes by thirteen authors
represented in 1916 the formal output of these two hundred teachers thru a score
of years. The largest number at any one school is six at Warrensburg. Two-thirds of
these were modest textbooks of various kinds, the remainder were doctor's theses or
dealt with local history. About twenty teachers have contributed occasional scien-
tific articles to the better technical periodicals of their departments. Perhaps thirty
have written more or less for local school publications of merit, especially at Kirks-
ville and Cape Girardeau, and still others contribute now and then to local news-
papers and magazines. Except for two or three, it did not appear from the reports
submitted1 that any teachers could be termed systematically productive in a profes-
sional sense, aside from their teaching.
* Individual reports could not be secured from Warrensburg.
112 PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
Altho the limitations of Ms occupation may excuse a normal school teacher from
general research of the usual academic type, such exemption can scarcely apply to
his strictly professional obligations. The worker of this class is supposedly a labo-
ratory student in the psychology of public school pupils, and in the changing or-
ganization of materials for their ultimate use; he is a critical investigator of the
developing social needs of his community, and of the failures and successes of his stu-
dents in service. He is confronted with a vast number of difficult and unsolved prob-
lems with which he must of necessity deal in one way or another; if he is truly pro-
fessional, he will deal with them as scientifically as he can under the circumstances,
and with a progressively experimental purpose. Out of this experience should spring
a lively and invaluable professional literature registering the progress of the teacher's
own work for the benefit of similar workers everywhei^e.
The lack of such a literature and, to a great extent, the lack of the attitude that
would produce it, is readily traceable to causes already discussed. The deadening load
under which these teachers are forced to work makes it impossible. Four or five meet-
ings with classes each day not only leaves one no time for any but conventional pro-
cedure, but it sooner or later paralyzes a teacher's power to originate and carry thru
anything else. When to these are added correspondence courses, extension appoint-
ments, faculty committee work, and social obligations with students, a normal school
instructor is reduced to the status of a teacher in the usual secondary boarding school.
All of these duties should undoubtedly be performed, but by other people whose chief
business these duties might be.
Because of such conditions, and a frequent lack of sufficiently specialized training,
the professional consciousness of the group, so far as its concern with the productive
scholarship of its craft goes, is low. With certain exceptions its members who seek
public recognition do so thru work that takes them out of normal schools instead of
committing them more completely to the interests of these schools. The educational
and literary world is filled with men and women who served what they consider a
hard apprenticeship in normal school work, and date their real intellectual debut
from the time they left it. This persistent withdrawal and transfer of productive
minds to other fields, this apparent failure of the work itself to engage and hold
the devotion of many fine students who have undertaken it, has contributed not a
little to bring normal school instruction into a certain disesteem. "Academic" work
elsewhere, even at an equal or lower salary, is very generally preferred. All of this is
due to mistaken ideals and ought to be changed. The people who prepare public
teachers are potentially among the most important servants of the state. The soli-
darity of purpose among persons so commissioned should be profound, and their
practices should be the result of unlimited professional interaction. More rational
conditions of preparation, service, and reward among these teachers will undoubtedly
be marked by a productive scholarship that will be both an immense assistance to the
profession as a whole and a reassuring evidence of the high quality of its membership.
TEACHERS 113
ECONOMIC STATUS — FAMILY AND DEPENDENTS
Before discussing the salaries of the normal school teachers it is important to under-
stand certain other items that bear more or less directly on their economic situation.
Nearly nine-tenths of the male instructors in the normal schools are married ; of those
past forty years of age, all but one are married. Of the women, about eight per cent
are married, all of these teaching at Springfield and Cape Girardeau.
The median representative of the married teachers has two children; only three per
cent have from five to eight children, while nearly half have only one or none. A fair
comparison may be made between the parent families of all the married teachers over
forty years of age and the families that such teachers themselves have reared. The
median number of children in the present generation is two, and but thirteen per
cent of the families have four or more. The representative family of the preceding
generation in this group had six children; eighty -one per cent had four or more, and
thirty-six per cent had eight or more children. The change in family life is noticeable
even between the older and the younger teachers. The median parent-family among
all those over forty has six children and one-fourth of the families have more than
eight; as compared with a median of five with but nine per cent having over eight
in the younger group. The women come from smaller families than the men in both
age groups, as they are more frequently from professional or commercial families in
towns and cities.
The number of dependents measures the economic burden with greater accuracy
than the number of children. Here again the men are distinguished sharply from the
women. Only one-eighth of the men have no dependents, while of the women more
than half have only themselves to care for. Nearly half of the men have more than two
dependents, while slightly over one-tenth of the women have as many. One-fourth of
the men have more dependents than any of the women except two.1
LENGTH OF TENURE
The length of tenure in normal school positions is not unlike that in the univer-
sity. About sixty per cent of the teachers in both university and normal schools have
been in the institution from one to five years. Twenty per cent at the normal schools
and twenty-seven per cent at the university have served there nine years or longer.
One man in each group has served over thirty years. Among the five normal schools,
Maryville and Cape Girardeau exhibit the greatest contrast. Maryville has nearly
twice as large a proportion of one or two year teachers as has Cape Girardeau. Cape
Girardeau in fact shows a stability of faculty personnel exceeding even that of the
university, tho the significance of this can of course be judged only in connection with
training, experience, salaries, and proved teaching ability.
1 The differences between the schools are sometimes marked, tho probably without significance. At Maryville a third
of the men and half the women are unencumbered, while at Springfield three-fifths of the women but none of the
men are without dependents.
PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
SALARIES — VARIATION AMONG THE SCHOOLS
The salary variations among the five schools are large, revealing again the lack of
any stable principle guiding the regulation of wholly identical work for identical pur-
poses.1 Teachers at Warrensburg are better off by two hundred fifty dollars than at
Kirksville, The median salary of women teachers at Springfield is one hundred forty
dollars less than at Warrensburg, while the median figure at Springfield for both
men and women is three hundred fifty dollars below the median at Warrensburg.
Springfield, however, pays three-fifths of its men over eighteen hundred dollars as
compared with one-quarter so paid at Kirksville and one-eighth at Mary ville. Kirks-
ville gives only half of its women teachers more than twelve hundred dollars, tho
at Warrensburg eighty-four per cent receive from twelve to eighteen hundred. Such
marked differences have no justification and indicate weakness in the general admin-
istration.
COMPAEISON WITH THE UNIVERSITY
The difference between the median salary at the normal schools and that paid at the
university is $550.2 For the amount of work done as shown in weeks of service and
hours of instruction the normal school salaries, if rated by college standards, are ab-
surdly low. Considering their shorter year's work, the high school teachers of large
cities are much better paid3 than these officers of the state engaged in what the state
recognizes as collegiate instruction for one of its most important professional groups.
One of the dozen highest paid men in the normal schools receives $2400 for a year's
work. The corresponding teacher at a standard college receives $2500 to $3000, and
teaches three-fourths as many weeks in the year and three-fifths as many hours in the
week. Correcting a moderate college salary, say $2500, for these two extra loads, we
find that the college instructor would draw about $5500 if at his present rate of re-
ward he performed the time equivalent of what the normal school man now does for
$2400. The college instructor does not receive this higher recognition for nothing.
He supplies in knowledge, training, and grasp of his subject a commodity that is
worth already more than he gets for it, and if it be proposed to demand an equiva-
lent from normal school instructors, the indispensable outward indication that such
equivalence has been established is the approximate equality of reward.
THE BEST PAID GROUPS
Normal school salaries show no correlation with rank, as at the university, since
the normal schools have no such groupings of instructors. Age has some influence.
1 See page 423.
2 In arriving at this result the salaries at the university have been raised by the proportion of salary regularly paid
by the university for summer session instruction to compensate for the additional term of work required at the
normal schools and included in the normal school teacher's salary. See page 423, note 2.
a Median salary of St. Louis high school teachers, $1640. Correcting this for six weeks additional instruction required
of normal school teachers would give about $1875. The hours of weekly program of the two institutions are not far
apart — twenty-two to twenty-five.
TEACHERS 115
All those receiving over $#000 are thirty years of age or over. No one over thirty re-
ceives less than $1080. Those receiving $1600 and above number eight per cent of the
teachers in their twenties, forty-seven per cent of those in their thirties, fifty-six per
cent of those in their forties, and all of the remainder. The teachers of the group
receiving more than $£000 number twenty-four, all men, and exhibit certain charac-
teristics that throw light on conditions of promotion. Only five are over fifty years of
age. As a group they have had nineteen years of total experience, and have held their
present positions for eight years. They teach about twenty hours per week, twelve
of them teaching science or mathematics, six education, and six history, languages,
or music. Aside from the five who teach mathematics, four only, one each in music,
history, geography, and English, are specialists in subjects taught in the elementary
schools ; seven are deans or directors of training schools. Two-thirds of the number
have their present work clearly correlated with their training and experience, eleven
having graduate degrees, in most cases from first class institutions; four show excel-
lent training without specific experience, and three have had appropriate experience
but lack training. In three-fourths of the cases the visitors' estimates of their ability
were favorable.
The sixteen highest paid women receive between $1500 and $2000, Two are under
thirty years of age; three are fifty or over. Five have no four-year degrees; of the re-
mainder, eight hold the degrees of good institutions; four have done graduate work,
one holding a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania. As a group they have a
median total experience of twelve years, seven of which were in the present position.
They teach about twenty-two hours weekly in the following subjects: history (1),
mathematics ($), English (3), art (3), home economics (3), foreign languages (1), and
supervision (3). Here, as with the men, the special subjects of instruction in elemen-
tary schools are meagrely represented. Nine of the sixteen teachers show a definite
correlation of training and experience with their present work; five lack suitable ex-
perience in elementary schools, and two lack specific training. Four were not visited,
but only one of the remaining twelve impressed the enquirers as being an unsuccessful
teacher.
On the whole, the high salaries for both men and women in the normal schools
appear to represent a genuine selection with emphasis on good training, helpful expe-
rience, and genuine ability rather than on age or tenure, tho instances occur of each
of tbe latter. There is an obvious tendency, however, to favor teachers of academic
and college subjects or special subjects such as music, art, or home economics, to the
disadvantage of subjects bearing directly on the needs of elementary school teachers.1
This appears to mean either that marked skill in the fundamental function of a nor-
mal school teacher, that is, the giving of specific instruction in how to teach, has a
relatively diminished chance of financial recognition, or else that superior ability of
that kind is not present.
1 Of the seven well-paid teachers of mathematics five teach arithmetic, one cl^?ss each.
116 PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
INSURANCE
There is no retiring allowance system affecting normal school teachers in Missouri ;
their provision for the future must therefore depend upon their private savings either
directly or in some form of insurance. Nearly twice as large a proportion of men are
insured as of women, the proportion of men varying from seventy-two per cent at
Springfield to ninety per cent at Cape Girardeau, and of women from twenty-eight
per cent at Kirksville to fifty-five per cent at Warrensburg. Three-fifths of the insured
women hold endowment policies only, and one-fourth more hold both endowment and
other forms. Less than one- fourth of the insured men carry endowment policies only,
tho two-fifths carry both forms. Of the forty-one women reporting insurance nearly
one-half report the amount as $1000. One-fourth carry from $1000 to $2000, and
none holds over $4300. One-third of the men, on the other hand, have from $£500 to
$5000 in insurance, only six per cent holding less than $1500, and the highest group
— thirteen per cent — carrying from $8250 to $11,000. Two individuals carry $15,000
and $17,000. Of the teachers with dependents four-fifths are insured as compared with
two-fifths of those without dependents, and in general the amount increases with the
number of dependents.
TEACHERS AT HARRIS TEACHERS COLLEGE
The twelve teachers reporting in 1915 from Harris Teachers College at St. Louis
are older than those in the state normal schools ; the median age of the five men was
forty-three, and of the seven women fifty years. Nine were Americans, one was of Eng-
lish, one of Irish, and one of German parentage. Four were children of farmers, and
grew up in families averaging six children each. Two were born in Missouri, and one
gave no record; the remaining nine represent nine different states east of the Missis-
sippi from Tennessee north. One woman and all of the men were married; three had
children.
Four teachers of art, physical training, and penmanship had special education for
those subjects. The rest held bachelor's degrees, all but two from first class colleges,
and these two later took graduate degrees. Two held the doctor's degree, and one
other the master's degree; all from first class institutions. Eight had been partially
trained in normal schools. Teaching experience ranged from twelve to thirty-four
years with twenty-one as the median; the median tenure of position at the present
institution was nine years. All but one had experience in elementary teaching, while
three only lacked secondary school experience. In normal school work the experience
ranged from three to eighteen years, and two had taught in colleges.
The salaries are higher than at the state schools, and the men receive over one-
third more than the women. The median salary for men is $£850, and for women
$1880; the average salary is about $150 greater in each case.
Compared with the teachers in the state schools, it may be said that the teachers
at the Harris Teachers College are, as a group, more, mature, have better training,
STUDENTS 117
more, and more appropriate, experience, and are better paid. Furthermore, instead
of twenty or twenty-five periods, their programs average about ten class-periods per
week with a maximum of fifteen. There are in addition certain obligations in the ex-
tension department, but the total average load never exceeds fifteen hours.
B. STUDENTS1
AGE AND SEX — NATIONALITY AND NATIVITY
The five state normal schools of Missouri enroll annually between seven and eight
thousand students. Twenty-eight per cent are men, and slightly over half are second-
ary students, altho both of these proportions are diminishing with some rapidity.2
The ages of the group range from twelve to over fifty years ; about three hundred
are sixteen or less, and a few more than this are over thirty; but the middle fifty per
cent ranges from eighteen to twenty-two inclusive. The median age for all students
is twenty years; in the group attending only in summer, it is twenty-two; twenty and
twenty-two are likewise the median ages in the secondary and collegiate groups.3
Slightly over half of the students report the nationality 4 of their parents to be
American. Maryville with two-thirds, and Cape Girardeau with one-third, represent
the extreme proportions. English and German are the predominant foreign ele-
ments, and occur in nearly equal numbers.5 Natives of Missouri constitute nearly
seven-eighths of the students. The collegiate students are nearly three-fifths town
bred, while but half as many of the secondary students are from town.
PARENTAL OCCUPATION AND INCOME — SIZE OF FAMILY
A study of the parental occupations emphasizes the dominant rural background.
Parents engaged in agriculture furnish sixty-five per cent of all the students, altho
agriculture engages but thirty-five per cent of the industrial population of the state.6
Seventy-seven per cent of the secondary students come from such homes, while but
sixty-two per cent of the collegiate men and forty-eight per cent of the collegiate
women were children of farmers. On the other hand, twelve per cent of the collegiate
students are children of professional men, a class who make up less than five per cent
of the population.
It is usually difficult even for the farmer himself to form an exact estimate of his
annual income. It was not surprising, therefore, to secure such estimates only from
about half of the students who replied. Just half of these report $1000 or less, while
thirty per cent were from families receiving over $1500. But of the college women
taken alone, forty-five per cent had family incomes of more than $1500, while only
1 For a description of the data from which the conclusions in this section are derived, see pages 402-404.
* See pages 428, 429, 8 See page 429.
* It is quite possible that some students confused this term with ancestry. The school authorities at Cape Girardeau
believe this certainly to be the case there.
c See page 429. c See page 430.
118 PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
twenty-eight per cent of the college men were so well off.1 This modest financial status
of the student's family reappears in the extent to which self-help is undertaken. Half
of the men and nearly a third of the women were wholly self-supporting, and a few
others — seven per cent — supported themselves in part. Of the collegiate group
about two -thirds of the men were self-supporting.2
As in the case of normal school teachers, the students are from large families. The
median size is six with sixteen per cent from families of nine or more children,3 while
the median student in the school of education at the university is from a four-child
family, and but eight per cent come from families of nine or more children.
CHOICE OF VOCATION — OTHER TEACHERS IN FAMILY
The student's selection of teaching as an occupation appears to have been largely
due to the fact that some other member of the family had taught. This possibility
appears at least in the cases of over three-fifths of the students ; one-seventh of them
all belong to families having three or more other teachers.4 The proportion from fami-
lies other members of which at some time attended a normal school is still greater —
sixty-five per cent;5 and in nearly all cases these had attended the particular normal
school concerned. In two of the schools, Cape Girardeau and Springfield, the students
were asked what person or circumstance first interested them in teaching. Half of them
referred the suggestion to their families, and a fifth were inspired by "teachers;11 three
per cent suggested their desire for self-support.
FINANCIAL ATTRACTION
That the prospect of financial return enters largely into the reckoning appears
significantly from the replies to another question. "Is teaching the best-paid employ-
ment you could undertake?1' was answered by seven-eighths of the attendance at all
the schools. Seven-eighths of the women thought teaching their most promising op-
portunity, while fewer than half of the men were of that opinion ; the proportion of
secondary students is a little higher in each case than in the college group.6 Taken in
connection with the large majority of men not intending to teach permanently 7 this
result was, of course, to be expected. Even the forty-eight per cent who favored teach-
ing very likely considered it more profitable as an immediate and temporary occu-
pation only. In preference to teaching, agriculture received nearly half of the men's
votes and clerical occupations nearly half of the women's; professional services of
various kinds and trade are the next choices.
DISTANCE FROM SCHOOL
The effect of the school itself in determining the choices of students is difficult to
measure. Like most other educational institutions, its influence saturates its imme-
1 See page 431. 2 See page 431. 3 See page 431. 4 See page 432. * See page 432. 6 See page 431.
T See page 434.
STUDENTS 119
diate vicinity, and weakens rapidly with increasing distance. Accessibility, too, plays
an important role. The local county supplies about one-fourth of all the students in
the normal schools, including eighteen per cent who come from the local town. Six
or seven contiguous counties furnish another fourth ; the remaining twelve or fifteen
counties in the district contribute a third, while one-seventh come from other portions
of the state. Three per cent come from outside the state. The schools have steadily
claimed that much of their local attendance consists of students who have changed
their residence for the sake of school privileges. This seems technically to be the case,
but the inference as to its significance may hardly be justified; many have indeed
moved into town for the sake of the school privileges, but probably not more than
one-fifth of all these local students come from beyond the next county.1
PREVIOUS EDUCATION
The previous education of normal school students depends upon the occupation
of their parents. More than two-fifths had their elementary education in the rural
schools only. The remainder in about equal numbers attended graded schools or had
a combination of graded and rural school training. When questioned as to the amount
of elementary school attendance, they show a median of sixty-one months, or between
seven and eight years of eight months each. The reports of one- third fall within this
eighth year, a third had more, and nearly a thii'd had less. Over half report having
had from five to eight elementary teachers; nearly one-third had from nine to twelve,
and but one-tenth had more.2
The high school education of secondary normal school students will be shown in
considering the administrative problem of the secondary student.3 In the case of the
collegiate students, the most conservative figures would indicate that in 191S-14 two
out of three men and somewhat more than four out of five women had at some time
attended high school.4 Two-fifths and three-fifths, respectively, had attended a first
class high school. Completion of secondary work in high school is, of course, another
matter. The imperfect records available show that in 1913— 14 twenty-eight per cent
of the collegiate men and fifty-three per cent of the collegiate women had done their
secondary work before coming to the normal school.5 Approximately the same propor-
tions hold in the case of graduates, and are often much higher especially among two-
year graduates.6
1 Data represent resident students at Kirksville, Warrensburg, and Mary ville. Of those reporting local residence
(440), one-half say their parents moved thither for the sake of school privileges. But of these one-fourth moved in
from the same county, more than one-third from contiguous counties, and two-fifths only, or one-fifth of the entire
local group, from the remainder of the district or elsewhere.
2 Data used in this paragraph were secured from Kirksville, Warrensburg, and Maryville only. An occasional
student coming: from the practice schools confesses to having had up to one hundred and twenty-five elementary
teachers !
3 See page 296, * See page 432. 5 Reports from 1656 elementary teachers show similar results. See page 439.
6 In the eight years from 1907 to 1914, fifty-six per cent of the two-year graduates at Springfield took their secondary
school preparation elsewhere, largely at the Springfield high school and Drury College, these two institutions to-
gether sending forty-two per cent of those prepared outside the normal school. At Kirksville forty-seven per cent
PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
The figures given above were gathered at the beginning of this study for a still
earlier period and are certainly conservative, owing to the defective records of many
who were probably high school students. The replies of the students attending when
the schools were visited in 1915 may show the conditions more truly. To the direct
question: "Are you a graduate of a four-year high school?" four-fifths of the collegi-
ate women and three-fifths of the collegiate men reporting at Kirksville, Warrensburg,
and Maryville said "Yes." Students in all five schools replied as to the accessibility of
a three or four year high school. Seven-eighths of the collegiate women had had such
schools accessible, and seventy-one per cent had completed the course; two-thirds of
the collegiate men lived near such high schools, and nearly half completed courses
there.
If the conditions indicated here are typical, they are evidence of the existence within
the normal schools of two relatively distinct institutions, one recruited mainly from
high school graduates who come in for the higher work, and the other a shifting col-
lection of secondary students who in general do not continue their education at the
institution. Such disparate groups need different treatment. As set forth elsewhere,1
the normal school should probably be relieved of the secondary student altogether.
On the other hand, there plainly exists a collegiate student body of sufficiently homo-
geneous characteristics and preparation to make possible the organization of profes-
sional education on a satisfactory basis.
Two further items in the data on high school attendance may be of interest. One
is the fact that the collegiate men represent high school training to a much smaller
extent than the women. In the enrolment of 1913-14, slightly over half as large a pro-
portion of men as of women attended a first class high school for four years,2 tho this
varies at different schools.3 In turn, twice as large a proportion of men as of women
were educated solely at the normal school. From the point of view of the ultimate pur-
pose of the normal school this is an unprofitable situation : a group of people who have
but a transitory connection with the profession in the state is receiving an excessive
share of the school's attention.
The other point to be noted is that the group of students attending only in the
of all graduates, 1909-15, were prepared in high schools; in 1914 and 1915 alone, fifty-two per cent. At Cape Girar-
deau, fifty-five per cent of the sixty-hour class of 1914, and in 1917 sixty per cent of all graduates were high school
graduates also. At Warrensburg, the sixty-hour class of 1915 showed seventy-seven per cent who were prepared
wholly outside and ten per cent in addition who had over three years of high school work.
It is noteworthy that in general high school graduates do not remain at normal schools for the four-year degrees.
At Kirksville, where most of these degrees have been granted, but one-quarter of them were conferred upon high
school graduates from 1909 to 1915, as compared with one-half of the one and two year certificates which went to high
school graduates. At Cape Girardeau, 1917, one-third of the four-year degrees went to high school graduates, as
compared with three-fifths of the shorter course certificates. The figures here given are for groups casually selected
as more or less complete information was accessible.
1 See page 295. 2 See page 432.
8 Warrensburg and Maryville show twice the proportion of the other three schools. At Springfield and Cape Girar-
deau this might be expected, owing to the backward character of large areas within these two districts. The Kirks-
ville district, however, led all others in the number of first class high schools in 1915, having fifty-three, as com-
pared with thirty-seven and forty-four in the Warrensburg and Maryville districts. Yet the proportion of men at
Kirksville in 1916 who graduated from high schools is only about half that in the other two schools. The situa-
tion is difficult to explain unless by reference to Kirksville's peculiar policies for attracting and retaining in her
collegiate department men students whose secondary work is incomplete.
STUDENTS 121
summer represents consistently more of the high school product than does the attend-
ance at the regular session. The collegiate summer students have an advantage of nine
percent in the number of those having had four years in a first class high school. This
seems to indicate that the high school graduate is more likely to go directly into teach-
ing, attending the normal school later as required in order to maintain certificates
or professional status. Such a tendency coincides with the reports from high schools
quoted below.
QUALITY OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENT
Certain other facts may be presented in this connection that throw light on the
normal school student from an outside source. The principals of fifty-eight first class
high schools, outside of St. Louis and Kansas City, were asked to rate in three grades
the members of one of their recent graduating classes, first, as to their standing in
studies, and again as to the quality of their personality,1 indicating in each case the
occupation of the student during the following year. The replies show, for these schools
and classes, the proportions in which the students in three quality groups are distrib-
uted among various types of occupation or institution.2 The ratings concern a total
of nearly nine hundred graduates.
The most striking revelation is the exceedingly small proportion of high school
graduates who go at once to normal schools — six per cent. The reason, to be sure, is
not far to seek : over one- third of the girls and nearly one-tenth of the boys from these
high schools go directly into teaching. For this work most of them have the prepara-
tion afforded by the high school training classes.3
The qualitative features of the ratings are suggestive. The college group, which
takes forty-seven per cent of the men graduates, includes sixty-five per cent of the men
whose personality rating is " A " as compared with forty-seven per cent of the men who
are "A" in their studies. The same relation obtains among the women, altho to a
less degree. The graduates in the normal school and teaching groups, on the other
hand, are stronger in their studies than in their personal qualities. Over half of the
women who rank "A" in studies go to the normal school or into teaching as com-
pared with less than one-quarter who attend college.
Analysis of the distribution according to quality within each institution or occu-
pation* indicates the same result. Of the college men less than one-third received
u A" in studies, but in morale they are superior, having more "A's" than "B's" in
1 The enquiry to the principals ran in part as follows: " You are requested to list below the members of the grad-
uating class, indicating- in each case (1) a percentage rating which shall approximately express the standing of the
individual in his studies; (2) a letter rating in three grades, from A down to C, which shall express your estimate
of the general efficiency of the individual as to character, initiative, and personal effectiveness; (3) the occupation
of the individual during the succeeding year."
2 See page 482.
8 Of the fifty-eight schools reporting, twenty-four had training classes that year, and the graduates of these train-
ing classes numbered altogether two hundred one, practically all of whom taught the next year. This is almost
tne total number who went directly into teaching — two hundred twenty. How many of them finally go to the
normal schools either for summer terms or as regular attendants is uncertain.
* See page 433.
122 PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
personality. The men graduates of high schools who are in normal school or are teach-
ing, on the contrary, show high ability in studies, but relatively low ratings for per-
sonality; thus, while forty- four per cent of the normal school men received "A" in
studies, only eleven per cent received "A" in personality, as compared with sixty-seven
per cent who received "B." The women show a contrast of the same sort, which is
more significant because their numbers are larger. More than half of the college women
are rated "A" in personality as compared with thirty-six per cent rated "B," while
at the normal schools and in teaching the ratio is nearly reversed.
If the collective judgment of these high school principals is correct, it shows that
among graduates from high school both the immediate work of teaching and the
normal schools themselves are attracting good and industrious minds but second-rate
personalities, while the college draws the strongest, most virile, and ambitious char-
acters, tho not necessarily those who are the best in studies. This would corroborate,
to an extent, the popular judgment in the matter. It is a situation that can hardly
be changed until a standard preparation is required for teaching, and the normal
schools, instead of loosely knit catchalls with vague functions, become intensively or-
ganized, self-critical, and selective institutions. Such a consummation waits directly
upon a social policy that will subsidize far more heavily than to-day both the process
and the product of such schools.1
COMPARISON OF SECONDARY TRAINING IN HIGH SCHOOL AND IN NORMAL SCHOOL
The object of a second minor excursus, undertaken in connection with the consid-
eration of high school preparation for the normal school, was to discover the quality
of work done in the normal school by high school graduates, as compared with the
work done by students whose secondary training was secured in the normal schools
themselves. With this in view, graduates of each school, except Maryville, who had
completed there eight or more units of secondary work,2 were compared, as to the
ratings earned on their subsequent college work, with graduates who had taken more
than fifteen units in high school. That is, the marks given in each school to the group
of graduates prepared wholly outside were compared with those given to graduates
who had from half (presumably the latter half) to all of their preparation in the school.
The ratings of about four hundred students were examined.3
The results of this comparison are negative rather than otherwise. Kirks vi lie rates
the high school graduates in these classes slightly higher than the students to whom
she has herself given secondary training; in the sixty-hour group the difference is
marked. The other three schools, however, give a few more high ratings to those who
1 The figures used here are for graduates of first class high schools only. Returns from one hundred twenty-two sec-
ond and third class and unclassified schools are less reliable, but show the same tendencies, especially in the lower
ratings of those who leave high school to teach as compared with those who continue.
8 It was necessary to include some who had had a part of their secondary training outside of the normal school in
order to make the two groups comparable in size.
s See page 483.
STUDENTS
have taken their secondary work locally. On the whole. It does not appear that high
school graduates fare conspicuously better or worse than those who take secondary
work in the normal school.
ATTENDANCE AT COLLEGES AND OTHEB NOJIMAL SCHOOLS
The normal schools do not appear to draw extensively from colleges, or to exchange
many students among themselves. Prom the collegiate attendance at these schools
during the regular session of 1915 nine per cent had attended colleges, two- thirds of
them for a year or less. Three-fourths of these were women, and about st third of the
total had been at the state university. Of the whole attendance for the same time and
schools, but three per cent had been at other normal schools, and three-fourths of
these were at other schools in Missouri.
TEACHING EXPEBIENCE
The most distinguishing characteristic of the student body in many western nor-
mal schools, as compared with that of other higher institutions, is the fact that, for
the most part, its members are drawn intermittently from active pursuit of the prac-
tice for which the schools are expected to prepare them. In Missouri this situation
is due chiefly to the mistaken policy of the state in allowing Its teacher supply to be
regulated largely by local economic considerations instead of buttressing the schools
with reasonable legislation; but the schools themselves are partly responsible. Altho
the results of this practice are unquestionably bad for the service in that the lower
positions are systematically exploited for the sake of the higher, the ad vantage to the
individual student is marked. It gives him the opportunity of earning the money to
pay his way, and the effect of these inter-layers of experience upon his education, is
doubtless stimulating to a limited extent, assuming that he is preparing to teach per-
manently; where the student is simply alternating study and teaching with some
alien purpose in view, the procedure has nothing whatever to commend it.
Of the total annual enrolment in the normal schools, half of the men and three-
fifths of the women had already taught.1 Of the collegiate group, two-thirds were
teachers, while of the secondary students, two-fifths of the men and over half of the
women had had teaching experience. It is encouraging, however, to note that during
the regular session the conditions are better. Leaving out the summer session, only
two-fifths of the students have had teaching experience, and the proportion is greatest,
naturally, in the collegiate group, where it is nearly one-half; among the secondary
students the proportion dwindles to less than one-third. For three of the schools2 it
was possible to discover the nature of this experience. Rural school teaching predom-
inates, as one would expect; about one-seventh of those in the collegiate group who
have taught, lacked rural experience, and practically all teachers among the second-
ary group have been rural teachers, tho a quarter of them have had some grade work
1 See page 483. a Kirksville, Warrensburg, and Maryville.
PERSONNEL OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
also. One-fourth of the college students have done both rural and grade work, and
about one-tenth have done some high school work. The collegiate women had been
teachers only; but about two per cent of the collegiate men had been superintendents
and three per cent had been principals. In length of experience, the summer session
group shows a median of twenty-one months as compared with sixteen months among
regular session students who have taught.
These facts reveal the presence during the regular session of a majority of students
who are making their education continuous; and show that an evolution from the earlier
conditions is in progress, tho still far from complete. There would accordingly appear
to be good reason why the schools should establish thoroughly organized curricula for
students who are expected to remain and complete the course consecutively, and for
those only, — a suggestion more fully elaborated elsewhere.1 Provision of another sort
would be made for those experienced teachers who attend chiefly in the summer.
IMMEDIATE INTENTIONS OF STUDENTS
The intention with which students come to the normal schools was sought by
direct questions to the students in attendance when the schools were visited. Replies
as to intention to teach permanently have an important bearing upon certain ad-
ministrative situations,, and are discussed elsewhere.2 Intentions as to teaching im-
mediately on leaving the school were stated by all but six per cent of twenty-four
hundred students, tho with much variation between the schools. Three-quarters of
the men and nine-tenths of the women intend to teach, but here again wide differ-
ences appear. Nearly half of the secondary men reporting at Mary ville will not teach,
while at Springfield only one-seventh so reported. The women are in every case more
generally committed to teaching than the men, tho less so at Mary ville and JCirksville.
Questions as to alternative occupations put to those not intending to teach show that
not far from half both of men and women hope to go elsewhere to study; nearly one-
third of the men will farm ; the remainder indicate several different occupations.
STUDY ELSEWHERE
Questions as to intentions for further study disclose the extent of the influence of
various institutions. About two-fifths of the collegiate men students and one-tenth of
the secondary group are bound for some college or university. Over half of the men
making this declaration name the University of Missouri; about one-third are unde-
cided, and one-sixth prefer outside institutions. Two-fifths of the women expressing
the intention to go to college incline to the University of Missouri, but more than
one-quarter of them are going to Chicago, Columbia, or Wisconsin. Missouri insti-
tutions other than the state university interest about one per cent of the collegiate
students in the normal schools who plan to do college work elsewhere.
1 See pages 301 ff. * See page 298.
STUDENTS 1S6
STUDENTS AT HARRIS TEACHERS COLLEGE
The women studying at the Harris Teachers College ranged in age from seventeen
to thirty-eight, but only eight per cent were over twenty-one; three-fourths were
from eighteen to twenty. It is a town-bred group; only seven per cent grew up in
the country. Over four-fifths were natives of Missouri, and all but four had their
homes in St. Louis. Nearly two-thirds were of American stock; a few were of Ger-
man and one of English parentage, and about thirty per cent were mixtures of these
and other nationalities.
The fathers of these students were city workers; more than one-third were engaged
in trade, one-fourth in manufacture and mechanical industries, nearly one-tenth in
clerical occupations, and the same in various professions. Transportation and public
service each engaged four per cent. In ten per cent of the cases the father was not
living. The paternal income was generally given : fourteen hundred sixty dollars was
the median figure; one-fifth received one thousand or less, and one-fourth over two
thousand. The total family income was consistently higher throughout, with a me-
dian of seventeen hundred fifty dollars. In point of size the median family had four
children; one-tenth had only one child, and one-fifth had more than five children;
over one-tenth had eight or more.
The home environment in most cases was not academic. Only forty-three per cent
of the fathers and thirty-nine per cent of the mothers had attended a high school;
sixteen and nine per cent respectively had attended college, while eight and twelve
per cent only had ever taught school* Altho the students at the state schools were
largely from families some members of which had taught, the reverse is true at St.
Louis. Almost eighty per cent of the families lacked any previous connections with
school teaching. The remainder with two exceptions had members that had attended
a normal school, all but one at Harris Teachers College.
Nine-tenths of the students came up thru the graded elementary schools alone,
nearly all of them in St. Louis; the remaining tenth had attended likewise some rural
school. All but three passed thru the St. Louis high schools, spending there four school
years or more except in one case.
Asked why they planned to teach, about one-third of the students indicated finan-
cial reasons or desire for an occupation; two-thirds expressed in some form their per-
sonal preference, inclination, or fitness for teaching, or their fondness for children.
Almost the same proportion, three-fifths, declared their intention to teach perma-
nently. Notwithstanding the fact that less than one-third indicated financial reasons
for teaching, fully eighty per cent felt that teaching was the best-paid employment
open to them. Most of the rest believed that other professional service or some cleri-
cal occupation was more remunerative. Regarding their professional training, nine
out of ten students considered what was asked of them as more diiScult but also
more interesting than their high school work; more difficult because of a curriculum
crowded with urgent and unfamiliar exactions, more interesting because of "better
186 PERSONNEL OE THE NOHMAL SCHOOLS
teachers,"1 <cmore individual responsibility and use of reason," and "closer connection
with future work," — "more vital/' "more practical."
Taken altogether these studen ts are clearly as homogeneous a group as could easily
be assembled for their purpose. Drawn from those ranking among the upper two-
thirds of graduates from excellent high schools, they possess a fairly assured and tested
foundation for special training. No small portion of their "immediate efficiency" is
due to their inbred knowledge of the school system thru which they have come and
in which they are presently to teach. The vocational motive is probably somewhat
more conscious than in the state schools; at least the students themselves have had
fewer family associations with teaching. Their even age, ability, and mental content
make the task of the college relatively simple.
It may be seriously questioned whether this homogeneity, so favorable from many
points of view, is not a serious disadvantage in important respects. Equality of age,
general high ability, and similar educational initiation is obviously desirable; but
that every teacher in the St. Louis elementary schools should have only the provin-
cial mental content of one rooted in a single spot almost from birth is not so certain.
In defence of this system of virtually absolute inbreeding it Is urged that it is only
the inbreeding of ideas that is dangerous, and that as the St. Louis child presumably
has more varied ideas than one bred in the country or in a small town, he therefore
possesses greater mental fertility. This theory appears to overlook the fact that the
mere number of items within a person's horizon has little to do with his resourceful-
ness. The city child's big buildings, "flats/9 street cars, parades, and "movies" may
blend together into au order of life that taken by itself is precisely as parochial as
is the experience of the country boy for whom trees, animals, and open country fur-
nish the principal details. It is only when one such well-understood order of life is
imposed upon another that fresh mental combinations are liberated and true insight
is made possible. In those who achieve distinction, this result is brought about thru
change of residence, travel, study, reading, pictures., and so forth. St. Louis now takes
persons whose minds already exactly mesh with the cogs of her present system, and
seeks to develop new speeds and progressive attitudes thru two years of further
contact with the same environment. It would be better for her schools if she had at
her disposal a considerable number of teachers equally well trained, but completely
ignorant of the St. Louis regime. "Immediate efficiency" that rests on such absolute
habifruation as the present conditions ensure, can hardly miss an unsound tendency
toward reaction and stagnation.
A public sanction for the present exclusive arrangement, that is always present,
and that has constantly to be combated by the school authorities, is the theory that
Harris Teachers College is primarily a public vocational opportunity for St. Louis
girls. Much opposition to the "upper two-thirds" rule, already referred to, has been
encountered on this score, the best interests of the schools for which teachers are
desired being lost sight of in the attractive idea of convenient breadwinning posi-
STUDENTS 127
tions. A further consideration,, of course, is that women living at home may be had
on terms lower than the salaries for which teachers of equal training could be in-
duced to come from outside.
The general situation at St. Louis confirms thoroughly sympathetic observers in
the belief that the educational interests of the city as well as of the state at large1
would ultimately be better served if the Harris Teachers College were a state insti-
tution, supported by general taxation but operated in close connection with the St.
Louis city school system. It should then be open on attractive terms to candidates
from all parts of the state, and from among these St. Louis, or any other Missouri
city, could select the best teachers it could afford to pay. The training provided in
the existing state schools is not at present such as St. Louis could profitably utilize.
The time should soon come, however, when this can no longer be said; these schools
should offer for the whole state a thorough, selective preparation suitable for a part,
at least, of the staff in any great city.
It is impossible to close this section without an expression of appreciation of the
character of the student body of the normal schools. In or out of the classroom,
whether in conversation or unconscious of the observer, these boys and girls pro-
duced the impression of unlimited industry and a consuming purpose. Much of this,
perhaps, is the result of sheer vocational impulse; certificates must be earned and
maintained. But the larger significance of their opportunity is seldom absent, and
the influence of individual teachers as well as, usually, the spirit of the school as a
whole, continually emphasizes it. It would be difficult to propose a more appealing
or responsive task for men and women of intellectual and moral power than well-ad-
ministered professional relations with students of this sort.
1 See page 60.
VII
CURRICULA OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
A. OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF CURRICULA FOR THE PREPARATION
OF TEACHERS
CONDITIONS in Missouri suggest several fundamental questions relating to the prin-
ciples and policies of curriculum organization for institutions that prepare teachers.
Particularly significant are the questions relating to: 1. Standards of admission;
2. Residence requirements; 3. Prescription versus election; and 4, The extent and
criteria of curriculum differentiation.
1. Standards of Admission
PROFESSIONAL SUBJECT-MATTER WELL DEVELOPED
Among the factors that determine the length and content of a teacher's initial pre-
paration, two are essential : the first is the extent to which the resources necessary for
good teaching have been organized into disciplines that generate or promote the power
to teach; the second is the extent to which society is willing to expend money in
securing the advantage of these disciplines for the teachers of its children.
Fortunately there is no question as to the extent to which profitable subject-matter
is available. Education is an old field in its philosophic aspects, and the scientific
studies of the past twenty years have supplied a wealth of material concerning its
resources, nature, and processes that has gone far toward its firm establishment on
a scientific basis. For any grade of teaching the construction of a four-year professional
curriculum is at best a difficult process of selection among apparently indispensable
studies and experiences. To compass this in two years can be accomplished only by
the frank sacrifice of matter of unquestionable importance and the reduction of what
is retained to abbreviated summaries. The worth even of this training is amply proved,
however, by the experience of schools everywhere accessible. Specific training was
adopted first in large cities, and from there has been carried over to the smaller com-
munities. Nowhere has a community, progressive in other respects, diminished the
professional preparation given its school teachers. The education of the teacher has
measured the quality of the school, and that in turn has been an almost unfailing
index of the quality of the community. Everywhere the natural pressure and demand
on the part of those responsible for education is for more and better preparation and
not for less. This would not be the case if the training had failed to show good results.
The consensus of intelligent opinion is that it does show good results, and, further,
that in so far as the educative procedure appears defective, it is largely some defi-
ciency in the character and amount of the preparation of the teacher that is respon-
sible.
STANDARDS OF ADMISSION 139
CHIEF QUESTION is ONE OF PURCHASE AND DISTRIBUTION OF TRAINING
It is not a question, therefore, of the existence of effective tools, skill, and know-
ledge wherewith teachers can be equipped. It is a question simply whether the state
as a whole will deny modern educational advantages to certain groups of its youth
while they are enjoyed by other groups. St. Louis has had a large number of profes-
sionally trained teachers for many years, and recent tests of her public school system
reveal the admirable quality of the results. She would prefer to pay twice their cost
rather than revert to former conditions. Kansas City has more recently adopted the
same policy. Educated elementary teachers are scattered thru other towns and cities in
varying numbers, but outside of a few large towns the elementary schools are in gen-
eral conducted by partially trained, or locally trained, or wholly untrained teachers,
who are correspondingly inefficient. To be more exact, the conditions are as follows:
Teachers of elementary schools with two or more years of professional preparation in
advance of a high school curriculum constitute forty-one per cent of the total in St.
Louis, twenty-three per cent in Kansas City, sixteen per cent in the smaller urban
districts of the state, and a negligible proportion in the rural districts. These figures
do not fully represent the case, however, for St. Louis, during recent years, has added
well-trained teachers only, while the state at large is making no such progress.
For this situation there is no justification ; it is a case of ample funds for well-pre-
pared teachers in some quarters and meagre funds for poorly prepared teachers in
others. The needs of the child in the small town or village are as great as those of the
child in St. Louis ; and the needs of the country lad are greater than either. Rural
school teaching actually demands a higher grade of teaching efficiency than any
other branch of public school service: the problems of successful organization and
instruction are more varied and more difficult; the range of subject-matter in which
the teacher should be "letter perfect" is wider; supervision is less frequent and usually
less competent; and the responsibilities of the teacher for community leadership are
much heavier. To meet these demands, teachers can be had ; excellent training is avail-
able ; the money cost is relatively unimportant to a wealthy state like Missouri ; the
only thing really lacking is the determination on the part of the state to give every
child, wherever he may be, opportunities equal to those enjoyed in the centres of pop-
ulation that have developed a keener sense of responsibility than the state as a whole
has felt for itself.
MISSOURI HAS TEMPORIZED WITH COMPROMISES
Instead of dealing with this problem in a businesslike and thoroughgoing manner,
Missouri, like many other states, has temporized with a series of compromises,
alleging that the more vigorous program was " impracticable." She has prided herself
on legislation providing that by 1918 no person with less than a high school educa-
tion receive high grade licenses, whereas such a limit is at best but a reasonable mini-
mum for admission to training ; and even this requirement is nullified to a considerable
130 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
degree by retaining the old third grade certificate intact for teachers with scarcely
more than elementary schooling. In order to make high school graduates into teachers,
the familiar expedient has been resorted to of giving them certain secondary courses at
the hands of a special teacher, and a small appropriation, is being annually devoted to
this purpose. The establishment of these secondary agencies for the training of teach-
ers, while doubtless productive of good in many backward districts, has occasionally
had a distinctly unfoi'tunate effect. The graduates of the high school training classes,
usually town or city girls, have revealed the same unwillingness to enter the rural
school service as have graduates of the state normal schools, and the pressure for the
appointment of such graduates to positions in the home town and city systems where
high school training classes have been organized is sometimes too insistent for the
school authorities to resist successfully. This weakness can probably be improved by
more skilful regulation, especially by recruiting country boys and girls for this work,
but the only final solution is to place the preparation and the rewards for teaching in
the rural schools on a level with, conditions in any other group, or if necessary to
grant an additional bonus to such teachers.1
AN ADEQUATE POLICY NEEDED
In view of the whole situation it should be determined that admittedly low grade
curricula shall not be tolerated longer than is necessary to remedy even more fun-
damental defects. States as widely different in the characteristics of their rural life as
Massachusetts and California have succeeded in making high school graduation a pre-
requisite for admission to rural school training curricula, and Missouri can do the
same. A persistent campaign for a larger and more skilfully distributed state school
fund in such rich and prosperous states as Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, and Missouri, coupled
with renewed and redoubled efforts to establish the principles of consolidation wher-
ever consolidated schools are possible, should speedily render unnecessary the effort
to provide professional preparation on the secondary level. The high school training
classes have rendered an important service, but to consider them as a satisfactory and
permanent solution of the problem would be to perpetuate a standard of preparation
utterly inconsistent with the fundamental significance of rural education to the pros-
perity and welfare of the nation.
It should be borne in mind, of course, that a standard prerequisite for professional
training implies a required training beyond that prerequisite. To set this fact in clear
relief as well as to increase the emphasis upon the preparatory as distinct from the pro-
fessional institution, it would undoubtedly be of great advantage completely to sever
the two kinds of work, and to confine the normal schools strictly to higher profes-
sional instruction. As explained elsewhere,2 this appears to be practicable in Missouri
and should be carried out.
1 This expedient has been tried successfully in Baltimore County, Maryland.
a See pagres 166, 295, SCO.
RESIDENCE REQUIREMENTS 131
SHOULD PREPARATORY CURRICULA BE PRESCRIBED?
Assuming that the standard professional curriculum will require a measure of
preparation equivalent at least to graduation from a four-year high school, the ques-
tion arises : Shall the character of the preparatory curriculum be more specifically pre-
scribed ? There would, indeed, be many advantages in making requirements that would
enable the normal schools and teachers colleges to omit from their professional cur-
ricula a number of purely academic subjects. On the other hand, definite prescriptions
of courses that must be completed prior to entrance might necessitate an early voca-
tional choice upon the part of the high school pupils, and thus, in effect, make the
high school curriculum preparatory to normal school entrance essentially vocational.
This would certainly be the case if the subjects taught in elementary schools were
prescribed as part of the entrance requirements, — a policy that has been proposed on
the ground that it would free the normal school from the necessity of offering review-
courses. In the mutual interests of both high school and normal school, as well as in
justice to the secondary pupil, it is believed that the best preparation for the profes-
sional work of the normal school or of the teachers college would be a well-chosen pro-
gram of general secondary studies rather than a specific and essentially vocational cur-
riculum. From this point of view, there could be no objection to specifying among the
admission requirements the satisfactory completion of certain courses characteristic of
a liberal education : mathematics, one or more of the natural sciences, twoor more units
of history, and perhaps four units of English; but to specify spelling, arithmetic, or
other elementary subjects would be to substitute their inferior treatment on a second-
ary level for serious professional attention later on. Furthermore, with a period of pro-
fessional work in view, it is clearly unwise to force a vocational choice before the com-
pletion of secondary education. The problem of taking care of the necessary "reviews"
of the common branches in curricula of collegiate grade will be discussed later.1
While there are some who consider four years of secondary study as an unattain-
able prerequisite for professional work, there are a few who would increase this require-
ment by adding two years of general college education as the basis of admission to
the professional curricula. This proposal is so closely involved with considerations
affecting the nature of the professional curricula themselves that it seems appropri-
ate to defer discussion of it to another publication,2
2, Residence
Two years of resident study at a training institution seem for the present to be a
reasonable minimum for the preparation of all grades of elementary teachers, and
should be systematically enforced by suitable certification. This, however, is but the
1 See pages 149 f., 227.
2 The Foundation has in progress a revision of its suggested Curricula for the Professional Training of Teachers
in American Public Schools, in which this problem will he fully discussed.
182 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
beginning of a real solution of the problem of elementary instruction in Missouri,
as in the United States as a whole. To meet the situation in fully adequate fashion,
two fundamental demands must be satisfied: first, the school-going youth of the coun-
try must be provided with teachers selected for their natural fitness and in confident
possession of such knowledge and skill as our best training can supply; and secondly,
the service of such teachers must be prolonged to the point where, as in other pro-
fessions, the accumulated power of successful experience may accrue to the permanent
advancement of the cause they serve.
a. PROLONGED PREPARATION NEEDED FOR TEACHERS OF ALL GRADES ALIKE
In planning a program for the preparation of teachers for America one must be
aware that all the hopes and ideals of our democratic society itself are bound up in the
eventual result. If the supreme service of one generation to the next is to place it most
advantageously upon the stage, that service can be concentrated and ensured nowhere
so effectively as in the selection and preparation of the teachers to whom chiefly the
task is delegated. Indeed, so far as education thru schools is concerned, the teacher is
the sole channel of influence. It requires no argument, therefore, to convince a thought-
ful American that any process that renders his agents who deal with oncoming youth
conspicuously more successful in bringing to pass the ambitions of the present for the
future, is a paramount consideration.
Such a process is emphatically the progressive education of a teacher in the content
and significance of the social order that he is passing on for reproduction or better-
ment; such is likewise his refinement in knowledge of the physical and mental makeup
of the child he teaches ; such is certainly his observant study of skilled teachers and
his own initiation under their leadership. As already pointed out, the sanction for all
of this has been fully confirmed in the action of progressive communities everywhere.
There is no longer any question of requiring that teachers be prepared; the really
important question now pressing for answer is the question of the extent and appli-
cation of this preparation among teachers of different grades or groups of children.
WHY LONGER TRAINING FOR HIGH SCHOOL TEACHING?
The best approach to a consideration of this problem may perhaps be made bv
facing frankly at once the concrete issue which throws it into high relief. An accept-
able teacher in the ninth, tenth, eleventh, and twelfth grades of our public school
system must have had four years of college training supplemented in the better insti-
tutions by a year or more of graduate work devoted to education and to the partic-
ular subjects to be taught. But from the first grade to the eighth inclusive a teacher
with a normal school training of two years beyond the high school is officially sat-
isfactory. What are the grounds for this remarkable distinction occurring sharply
at the end of the eighth grade? In the order of their increasing probability the follow-
ing explanations suggest themselves.
RESIDENCE REQUIREMENTS 133
It is said that a longer and therefore presumably better training has been demanded
for the teachers of the highest grades because there were fewer of them, and a more
rigid selection was therefore possible and natural. There appears to be no valid reason
for believing that this is true. Secondary teachers are indeed relatively fewer than
elementary teachers because the number of secondary pupils has been and is propor-
tionately smaller, but if the inference of better training were correct, it would hold
good also as between eighth grade teachers and primary teachers where the same
relative disparity in numbers exists. It might be sought for the same reason between
teachers in the twelfth and those in the ninth grades, even in spite of the depart-
mental character of this work. No such distinction in length of training is to be
found at these other points. In fact, the training of the primary teacher is the one
phase of preparation for elementary instruction that has been clearly differentiated
from all others and given special emphasis. Plausible as the suggested distinction may
appear at first glance, there seems to be no good reason why a group of public servants
should be better prepared for its work simply because the group is small, tho that
fact may of course facilitate selection occurring for other reasons.
Is HIGH SCHOOL INSTRUCTION MORE "ADVANCED"?
A second suggestion frequently offered as a sufficient reason for the distinction in
question is that the work of the four higher grades, commonly known collectively as
the "high school," is "advanced" work and therefore requires the "advanced" prepa-
ration of a college course. And it is thereby implied that elementary instruction is
"elementary" work and requires but "elementary" preparation or perhaps only "or-
dinary common sense." Historically there is much truth in this explanation. For along
period high school teaching could be prepared for only in college, while no college
concerned itself seriously either with the studies or with the pupils of the elementary
school. As the normal schools gradually made good their function, the studies and
pupils of the elementary school became the centre of their attention. Partly for this
reason and partly because the colossal size and strangeness of the new problem led
many normal schools into obviously superficial and futile practices, the whole move-
ment was ignored and often actively misunderstood by the colleges ; even to-day many
college teachers and officers are uninformed as to its achievement and unimpressed by
its real significance.
The work of the normal schools, extended and systematized by university and
college departments of education, has brought into being a type of preparation fully
as indispensable to the elementary teacher and to society as a college course can pos-
sibly be to the high school instructor. The work of one has become as "advanced"
as that of the other, tho it deals with different materials. Compared with the sec-
ondary teacher, whose field is narrowly limited, the competent lower grade instructor
must possess a sure mastery in a relatively wide range of subjects, — a mastery that
the present brief training restricts almost to the bare material to be taught. The tech-
134 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING- PROBLEMS
nical difficulties of teaching and of class management appreciably increase in passing
from the higher to the middle levels of public school instruction; the equipment of the
elementary teacher in skilful technique must therefore be correspondingly greater.
In contrast with the strong natural sympathy existing between the well-chosen adult
teacher and the mature or adolescent youth, a teacher of younger children finds a
competent knowledge of his pupils and a permanent interest in them to be a more
remote and more difficult acquisition that must be sustained, if at all, by motives im-
plying a large social horizon and purpose. The lack of this, due to insufficient edu-
cation, is precisely the secret of the mechanical and commonplace older "grade"
teacher, familiar to every observer.
In the lower grades — primary and lower intermediate — the problems of manage-
ment recede in importance, or are at least less obtrusive, thus giving color to the pop-
ular idea that the teacher's task is simpler. Here the real need of skill in teaching and
especially of trained insight into the mental differences of growing children stands out
in all its significance. School systems in general have been organized to fit their weak-
est point, which is in the intermediate grades. Teachers that are inefficiently or me-
chanically trained make necessary the rigid curriculum with its allotted pages, iden-
tical for each of many varied minds; the mechanical supervision laid on firmly from
without is inevitable, and the result is the dead average of mass-progress. To be able
to treat third grade children intelligently as individuals, and to be safely entrusted
with the adaptation of educational materials to their varying capacities, requires an
ability that may be had thru education, but that to-day scarcely exists in these lower
grades, and is rarely to be found in the elementary school at all. Because bright
children can run unschooled until the age of ten or twelve and then be "brought up"
to their classes without great loss of time, it is argued that, after all, the early grades
are unnecessary except for the average or dull pupil. This is an undoubted fact, but
by another inference the whole evil situation is contained in the irony of it. It is non-
sense to suppose that under good conditions a teacher who knew her business could not
have given the bright child the lead that his capacity warranted. With apparently
little formal effort, the educated and sympathetic parent brings him along so fast that
he is obliged to stay out until the lock-step of the school catches up. The relatively
unskilled teacher of to-day, with the best of intentions, wastes the capable child's time
precisely because the real nature of her business is still a riddle to her, and what in-
sight she may have bears slight fruit because of a system organized to operate irrespec-
tive of insight on her part. So far as the work itself is concerned, therefore, it must
be contended that there is no longer any teaching position in the list for which " ad-
vanced" preparation may justly and profitably be denied in favor of any other.
SOCIAL DISTINCTIONS IMPLIED BETWEEN ELEMENTARY AND HIGH SCHOOLS
A third ground for the traditional distinction in the training of high school teach-
ers is rather more difficult of analysis, and is much less freely recognized than the one
RESIDENCE REQUIREMENTS 135
just discussed. After its inception the modern high school quickly became, like its
predecessor the academy, the special protege of the institution next above it. Where
high schools did not exist, preparatory departments in the college itself took their
place, as in the University of Missouri and other Missouri colleges. The early status
of the high school, then, was that of an institution suspended from the college in
the darkness beneath; not until it became full-formed and established did it tend
to build itself up out of a vigorous common school pressure from below, and even so,
up nearly to the present day, it has clung to the college for sanction of its aims,
methods, and program. The inevitable result of this intimate relationship was that the
high school was regarded and in fact became, like the college, the institution for the
education of children from relatively wealthy and cultured social groups. The public
character of the school considerably enlarged the circle, to be sure, but only those
could attend who, tho perhaps not destined for college, were at least able to command
the necessary leisure and support for study during four years above the elementary
school. The impulse to provide this, even at a sacrifice, was found chiefly in homes of
considerable refinement until the high school added a form of training that met a
purely vocational need and appealed to a different type of parent.
Thus grew the tradition of a public school, proudly alleged to be for all, but actu-
ally patronized by the wealthier and better educated elements in American life, and
playing but a slight part in the existence of the great majority of the people. For
these the "common" school did service* Often shunned in the largest cities, tho less
so where the population was more homogeneous, this outpost of civilized life has been
alternately the hope and the despair of all who trusted in it as the means for attain-
ing true democracy. With splendid ideals and obvious possibilities, by resting heavily
on the power of its traditional appeal, this often crude and awkward servant of the
state has accomplished on the whole an important service in spite of the wooden sys-
tem in which it is sometimes wedged, its often thoroughly mechanical processes, and
its subjection to the constant interference of the incompetent. Its worth has been
almost wholly positive; its failure, tho apparent, has been a failure in degree only,
THE ELEMENTARY TEACHEII versus THE HIGH SCHOOL TEACHER
The two institutions — high school and "common4" school — are completely revealed
in their teachers. Beginning abruptly with the ninth grade, where compulsory educa-
tion commonly ceases, the teachers must be college graduates and therefore suppos-
edly well initiated into the world of letters and culture. It has not till lately been
thought to matter much whether the teacher was prepared to teach; it sufficed if he
held a diploma. Most older secondary teachers are painfully aware that their profes-
sional training began when, they commenced to teach ; they may even be proud of the
various subjects that they suddenly "worked up" out of a forgotten or wholly vacant
past. Nevertheless, the teachers in our high schools and academies have been men and
women more or less at home in the best intellectual life of their generation. Their
136 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
varied studies, their college associates, their institutional and social experiences have
made them in a small way people of " affairs,*" — literary, political, social, and even
commercial, — representing interests to which the high school student ardently as-
pires. They may blunder egregiously in teaching, but even the blunderers possess usu-
ally something in their personal background that saves them from total failure. The
stronger schools require evidence of successful experience in their teachers, and the
tendency of recent regulations has been to require specific preparation for specific
positions, and still more recently to require graduate study and directed practice
work. The service offers, in its better positions, an agreeable and respected career in
close contact with collegiate interests. Such are the teachers who deal with the selected
youth from the better American homes.
Below the ninth grade attendance is commonly compulsory for all children for
whom no other provision is made. Teachers for these grades are recruited from high
school graduates who are given at most something over a year of specific preparation
for teaching the elementary school subjects — followed by a period of supervised prac-
tice in the schools. Sometimes the latter is concurrent with study or interwoven with
it, both requiring not more than two years in all. Married women are not desired in
the service; since nearly all elementary school teachers are women, the average tenure
of these teachers, trained and untrained, is about four years.1 The conditions of the ser-
vice are exacting; the hours are long, the constant contact with all types of childhood
is very trying to any but the soundest nerves, the extra demands upon a teacher's
time and energy for both school and pupil are incessant, and the financial reward is
utterly insignificant. The net result of the circumstances is that the majority of the
teachers in these grades seek the work solely from an economic motive, expecting or
hoping that it will be temporary. Training is given with this in mind. From the nor-
mal school"^ standpoint it is concentrated on meeting in the shortest possible time cer-
tain irreducible minima in the way of standards; from the student's point of view it
represents simply the condition of securing a license. Compared with even two years of
the four spent in college, the intellectual interests awakened are incidental and fugi-
tive instead of central and cumulative; mental stimuli received in high school cease
for lack of attention. Instead of persisting, like Alma Mater, a life-long shrine of high
thought and feeling, the training school, once finished, ceases to figure in the teacher's
thought, and his aspirations wither, lacking sure attachment. Whether a teacher for
three years or thirty, such a brief and concentrated treatment disposes one blindly to
reverence routine, to follow and to require specific directions, to eye too carefully the
sources of approval or censure; in short, to fit the system, and, worst of all, to make
unintelligent supervision easy. If the work becomes permanent, the uncertain attitude
of the early years may be thrown off and real growth may result. If so, it must still
spring by will and brain from the thin soil of scant initial training. The common
1 This average includes rural school teachers. The elementary teachers in the larger cities have a longer average
"life" — probably between eight and ten years.
RESIDENCE REQUIREMENTS 137
alternative is to make the prescribed procedure automatic and to employ the mind
elsewhere. Such is the teacher on whose instruction the attendance of children thru
eight of the most critical years of their lives is expected, and in Missouri, outside of
St. Louis and Kansas City, such a teacher receives annually for her services a salary
of I450.1
CONTRAST IN TEACHERS THE CHIEF OBSTACLE TO PROGRESS
This contrast between the teachers of a selected group destined to furnish the lead-
ers of society and those provided for the balance of the population is naturally most
keenly felt by the teachers themselves. The prestige of a high school instructorship
quite outranks that of a "grade" teacher's position in popular respect, and must, of
course, do so until training and compensation are equalized and the two schools are
merged in a single institution. To pass from an elementary school position to the
high school, as has been possible in small country high schools, or in city schools by
securing additional training, is rated as promotion to the disparagement of the "in-
ferior" job. Educationally this situation constitutes at present perhaps the greatest single
obstacle to progress. As long as the situation requires that a teacher rise by changing
his work instead of by capitalizing his experience and improving his work, little genuine
progress toward professional efficiency can be realized.
DISTINCTIONS IN TRAINING SHOULD DISAPPEAR
The deductions to be drawn from this brief review of public school cleavage must
be fully apparent. The present conditions cannot last in a republic pledged to Ameri-
can principles. The advantages of appropriate adolescent education from the four-
teenth to the eighteenth year, which are now theoretically open to each child, must
actually be placed in his possession. The same curriculum for all during these years
is absurd; but an education equally genuine and thorough for all alike and modified
only by the proved abilities of the child must be provided for every boy and girl in
the country thru their eighteenth year, and must be required of them if the United
States is to face the new world-era a fit and competent nation. This education will
necessarily assume many forms. The only form that it may not assume is one that
permits the social and financial status of an undeveloped youth to determine his
future. Thoroughly exploited and completely discredited in Europe, this system will
yield here, where its roots are weak, to an educational faith and policy whereby the
leadership that emerges shall be that of sheer mental, moral, and physical excellence.
The executor of this future is the teacher and no other. Created and supported
according to whatever vision prevails, it is he who determines the result. In making
1 This is the median annual salary of the women teachers in graded elementary schools who have had two or
more years of training in addition to four years of high school. Such teachers number only sixteen per cent of the
total ; the remainder lack so much training, but owing to a certificate system that penalizes proper preparation,
they receive nearly the same salary. The median is exactly the same, but thirty-five per cent only of the second
group receive more than $450 as compared with forty-nine per cent of the first group.
138 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
secondary education compulsory it is obvious that, to accomplish our final purpose^
the best present standard of training for the secondary teacher must be maintained —
that is, four or five years of organized and pertinent preparation. It should be equally
obvious that the problem of elementary instruction cannot be said to have been solved
until the training of elementary teachers is fully established upon a like basis. This
done, the American system of education becomes intelligible and defensible : a twelve-
year period of growth and training under superior conditions for every child, admin-
istered by a special class of teachers selected for similar and representative character
and power, and amply trained for their purpose; men and .women who are permanent
and resourceful students of their work, seeking a possibly equal distinction of ser-
vice and reward alike within all grades and subjects of instruction, and professionally
organized for the continued advancement of American schools.
Whether the accomplishment of the program outlined above is a matter of ten
years or of fifty is not our immediate concern ; it is necessary, however, to discern
clearly the goal toward which we ought to strive. Certain communities, like St. Louis,
are already asking whether a longer training for elementary teachers is not desirable,
and if so, what form it shall take. New York State is on the eve of converting its
two-year normal school curriculum into a three-year curriculum to be required of all
elementary teachers in graded schools. Massachusetts, in her state normal schools,
has organized three-year courses for upper grade elementary teachers; Rhode Island
is likewise upon a three-year basis; and scattered beginnings of the same sort are
observable elsewhere. The feeling is general that, altho the trained elementary teach-
ers are doing technically better work than the untrained high school teachers, they
are seriously lacking in substantial education, and the proposed lengthening of the
curriculum is intended partially to remedy this defect. High school teachers, on the
other hand, are under no such pressure to lengthen their preparation in point of time.
Progress for them hinges upon the reorganization of their curriculum for a definite
objective and the provision of real professional training comparable to that which the
best elementary teachers already enjoy. Were there apparent a clear tendency toward
requiring additional years, toward making a doctor's degree, for example, a qualifica-
tion for secondary instruction, the inference would be natural that the preparation
for secondary work was destined to maintain its old relative advantage. This is not the
case. Even the fifth year required of secondary teachers in California, in Rhode Island
(for state scholarships), and in some other communities, was added rather in order to
secure professional training without disturbing the unity of the college curriculum
than because a successful secondary teacher could not be well prepared in four years, if
provided with a curriculum planned for the purpose. The indications are rather that,
without prejudice to the secondary instructor, the work of his colleague in the elemen-
tary school will be regarded as of equal importance, specialization being relied upon to
provide for the greater intensiveness of the secondary teacher's task, and both candi-
dates being required to work out a careful technique suited to their respective fields.
RESIDENCE REQUIREMENTS 139
THE OUTLOOK FOR SUCH A PROGRAM
It is improbable that the adoption of lengthened curricula for prospective elemen-
tary teachers will be in any sense the slow and painful evolution that has brought us
to our present stage. What was once the gradual attainment of separate progressive
communities, an enlightened state now accomplishes at a single stroke. The old labo-
rious methods of educational progress are unnecessary when the principle is plain and
a commonwealth is fully persuaded; radical and adequate action must shortly take the
place of the piecemeal legislation that forever falls short. This fact should encourage
state and institutional administrators in comprehensive planning for the future. There
must indeed be a rational sequence in the steps taken, the first of which was indicated
at the beginning of the present section. It should, however, be clearly understood that
this is but a step in a much larger program to follow.
b. ADEQUATE RESIDENCE REQUIREMENTS DEPEND UPON PEOSPECT OF EXTENDED SERVICE
The second fundamental rearrangement that must be effected before the require-
ments of prolonged resident training can be reasonably enforced is a lengthened term
of teachers'5 service. It appears unlikely that under present or predictable economic
conditions the service of competent men in the elementary schools will assume any
but negligible proportions except for administration and, here and there, for special
undertakings with boys. It is true that in the newer portions of the country men are
still to be found teaching in the elementary schools, as in Missouri, but their number
has diminished steadily.1 In general, the men who can be obtained for regular instruc-
tion at prevailing salaries prove inferior to their women colleagues, and the disad-
vantage of "feminization," whatever it may be, would be ill remedied by entrusting
children to weak teachers simply because they are men.
For the present, at least, the obvious and necessary solution of the problem lies
in a quite different direction ; namely, in the recognition and development of teaching
as a permanent and serious profession for capable women who are attracted thereby,
wholly irrespective of their marriage. The enforcement of this point of view has so vital
a connection with the extension of residence requirements as well as with the spirit
and organization of curricula for the preparation of teachers that the considerations
on which it rests may well be presented at this point.
SERVICE OF WOMEN NOW TERMINATES WITH MARRIAGE
It is a widespread practice among American school boards to consider a woman
teacher's marriage as equivalent to resignation. Where not expressly provided in
formal regulations, the policy is often tacitly pursued by refusal to reappoint. It is
safe to say that the initial appointment of married women except when widowed or
clearly unencumbered with family duties is very rare. The usual justification for
1 The proportion of men in the teaching body has decreased since 1900 by 10.8 per cent in the country at large and
by 13,5 per cent in Missouri. Report of the United States Commission&r of Education^ 1917.
140 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
this practice is based on one of three grounds. The reason most frequently heard is
the familiar frank interpretation of tax-paid positions as a proper perquisite for
the needy citizen. A married woman is presumably provided for; therefore let some
young girl have the job.1 A second ground for objection is characteristic particularly
of school superintendents, and is to the effect that the work of married teachers is
more difficult to regulate, and that such teachers have meddlesome and redoubt-
able allies in the persons of their husbands. A third objection to employing married
teachers is the general and sound social conviction that it is the first business of a
married woman to look after her home, and this duty is considered to be impossible
of fulfilment if the woman holds a teaching position.
REASONS OFFERED FOR THE PRESENT PRACTICE
The first of these objections is held by a class of individuals with whom argument
is impossible; the only remedy is time, which may be trusted gradually to substitute
another point of view toward all public service. A certain warrant for the second at-
titude undoubtedly exists in experience under conditions that have prevailed in many
parts of the country. Inferior teachers, or those that have become inferior thru ceas-
ing to grow, entrench themselves in a community thru long, albeit dull and ineffi-
cient, service. The very presence of a home with husband and family gives them a
substantial status and a following. When occasion arises to exclude such a teacher,
a noisy protest ensues from all the partisans, most of whom are wholly ignorant of
educational standards if not of the specific circumstances, and if the administration
holds its ground, a situation may arise that nearly wrecks the system. In reply to this
it may be said that such episodes are characteristic of school systems in which a
mechanical tenure prevails, where the notion that teachers stand or fall according
to the excellence of their work has little root in the schools and none in the com-
munity. Such cases fall of their own weight when a school administration keeps unre-
mittingly before both teachers and citizens the conception that teachers exist for the
good of the pupils; when good work is carefully and persistently held up to view;
when the standards of selection are high; and when parents are made fully aware
that meritorious teaching is their due. It requires intelligence to do this. A higher
order of mental ability and training is necessary to lead and direct well-developed
personalities having local professional standing as a result of acknowledged achieve-
ment, than will suffice to handle a group of young girls coming from without, who
have no immediate friends and make no trouble when dismissed. The supply of super-
intendents of this type is unfortunately limited, but it is increasing. Except in spo-
radic cases, this objection, like the first, harks back to the time when fitness and
1 An unexpected illustration of this attitude appears in a recent action (September, 1918) of the Boston School Com-
mittee. The rule against married teachers appears to have been in part suspended owing to war conditions. But the
Committee refused at first to suspend the rule in the case of the wife of a commissioned officer, on the ground, as
quoted in a newspaper interview with one of the members, that she was already sufficiently provided for. The ap-
pointment was subsequently allowed, but only in order to conform to an assurance of the Superintendent to the
teacher in question before her marriage.
RESIDENCE REQUIREMENTS 141
training were undiscovered elements in a candidate's qualifications, while the com-
fort of the board in its relations with insistent citizens, or the convenience of the
superintendent in running his machine, was actually the determining factor.
WILL THE MARRIED TEACHER NEGLECT HER HOME?
The third consideration is of different character and should be seriously studied.
It is urged that, for a married woman with a family, teaching necessarily involves
neglect of the home which should be her paramount consideration. An indispensable
premise to any argument to the contrary must be that the question has to do only
with a woman well trained for professional life and whose occupation up to the time
of her marriage was the education of children. It must be assumed further that she
has been a skilful teacher and that she thoroughly enjoys her work, so that her
motive in continuing is not merely economic advantage. Women to whom this does
not apply clearly should not teach. A large number of well-educated women will un-
doubtedly find complete satisfaction solely in the high art of making and maintaining
a successful home. One of the finest products of modern higher education for women
has been the worth and dignity that it has revealed in this undertaking. For the
woman first described, however, the domestic situation is a complete brief in favor
of her further teaching service. Her income from teaching produces more than the
amount necessary to effect the household arrangements that her absence requires, and
thereby possibly delivers her from a round of petty duties that might be performed
equally well or better by some assistant — duties that are often in irritating contrast
to the intellectual concerns of an educated woman before she marries, even if they do
not actually lead to disappointment and stagnation. Meanwhile the teacher's profes-
sional work maintains and develops in her an intellectual freshness and skill that
makes her a superior guide for her own children as well as a more interesting com-
panion for her husband. Trained to systematic mental activity in the problems of
education, she is now also director of a private laboratory where these problems
work out, and her partial detachment in teaching gives her a clearer vision and per-
spective than is possible to a mother unassisted and constantly immersed in house-
hold detail — the usual alternative. With the family grown and gone, the situation of
the teacher-mother is incomparably superior to that of the mother-housemaid. Her
connections with the world are stronger and more significant, her grip on vital inter-
ests is surer, and her satisfactions in life are more durable; she is spared the desul-
tory "busy- work "of the mother whose mentality has been exhausted in housework;
and she has before her ten or twenty years of acknowledged usefulness that is the
logical cumulation of a life of directed study, service, and experience.
WILL THE MARRIED WOMAN PROVE A LESS EFFICIENT TEACHER?
The other and, for our purpose, more serious charge is that a married woman would
allow home duties to interfere with her school duties and thus become a less efficient
142 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
teacher. Again it must be assumed that we deal here with well trained and success-
ful teachers who like their work,, for only such teachers should pass the probationary
stage — whether married or single. It is scarcely probable that such teachers with
well-developed professional ideals will permit causes of undue interference with their
duties to continue long even if they arise. However, an argument of perfection can
hardly be turned against married teachers at this point. It is quite conceivable that
domestic or private concerns might create occasional diversion, but the same thing
occurs repeatedly with unmarried women teachers and even with men. It seems need-
less to press this point. The whole tendency of marriage for both men and women
is to steady and objectify one's effort, to sift out trivial and careless aims, and to
lay down lines of growth into a consistent and unified career. To discredit this fact
in favor of young, unmarried women, without serious responsibility or experience,
and at a period of conspicuously uncertain and distracted interest, is a manifest
absurdity.
MARBIAGE AN ADVANTAGEOUS QUALIFICATION FOB A TEACHER OF CHILDIIEN
On the other hands there is probably no work to which marriage and a normal
home life could contribute a qualification more essential than they could to teaching;
tho not without its application to men in dealing with adolescents, it would appear
well-nigh indispensable for women in the intelligent handling of small children.
In an educated and professionally well-trained woman, marriage and the deepen-
ing experiences of motherhood could not but serve to clarify her insight, to broaden
and humanize, her sympathy, and to intensify devotion to her central purpose, — a
purpose that would then link together and coordinate the processes of both home
and school. This latter result would appear particularly in the transformed relation
between the school teacher and the community. At present she figures as a detached
public servant in a class apart. If married and a householder having children, she
becomes a vitally interested and respected factor in society. With an education supe-
rior to that of most other women, she possesses, by virtue of her quasi-public position,
unusual opportunities for leadership and influence and would undoubtedly improve
them. A town whose schools were taught by its most capable and best educated
married women would, assuming that these were also well trained for teaching,
give the country a totally fresh and significant interpretation of public education.
Such a relation would carry the schools straight to the heart of society's most re-
sponsible group, and would make them immeasurably more responsive to the pub-
lic needs.
ENORMOUS WASTE OF THE PRESENT SYSTEM
Important as the above considerations are, the weightiest practical reason for the
married teacher is still another. The largest source of waste that OUT present system
of teacher supply involves is the waste of experience incurred in the loss each year of
RESIDENCE REQUIREMENTS MS
from one-fifth to one-fourth of the entire teaching population. The average teacher
no sooner becomes fairly efficient than she leaves the service,1 giving way to a recruit
who repeats the same mistakes of apprenticeship, leaving in her turn before these mis-
takes can be transmuted into matured skill. The very nature of the selection that
produces this loss seems to ensure the heaviest draft upon the best grades of ability
in the teaching personnel. Those with the most active, the most thoughtful and force-
ful minds, those who are most attractive and resourceful in dealing with children, are
oftenest among those that leave, and because they are successful, even under the pres-
ent hard conditions, they most frequently leave with regret. By encouraging the best
teachers either thru added salary or shorter hours, or both, to continue in the profes-
sion after their marriage, this constant drain will be partially stopped as the class of
selected, permanent workers increases.
CONSERVATION OF PROFESSIONAL EFFORT IN EUROPE
The present system is productive of a further loss, the effect of which may be under-
stood only by comparing American conditions with those prevailing on the Continent
of Europe. There the great majority of the teachers £re men. They assume their duties
with the knowledge that teaching is to be the life work for which they have received
a long and appropriate training. No sooner do they become established in their posi-
tions than they unite, with few exceptions, in teachers' societies that have for their
object the study and promotion of the schools they teach. These organizations are in-
cessantly busy. From them proceed the most effective criticisms of current practice and
carefully studied experiments directed toward improvement. As the body of teachers
is permanent, this mass of experience is cumulative, fine traditions are created, and
the teacher in service is educated, sometimes in spite of himself, to a very high level
of performance. As in the university and secondary schools abroad, so it is in the ele-
mentary schools : the teachers themselves control and develop in great part the func-
tion that they discharge.
ABSENCE OP ORGANIZED EFFORT AMONG ELEMENTARY TEACHERS IN AMERICA
Consider the situation among the agents of elementary instruction in the United
States. With much shifting from place to place they are in and out of school work
altogether in half the time that a child is expected to spend with them. Professional
coherence and activity does not and cannot exist; there is no time for the great cause
they are supposed to serve to take root in their imaginations; they move as individ-
uals without collective force or expression, completely at the mercy of the principals
and superintendents, good and bad, who direct them. Higher education with us is self-
directive; secondary education is partly so; while the average elementary teacher is
1 This statement is more than merely figuratively true. The " average " elementary teacher does not serve more than
four years, and the studies of teacher-rating jus tiftr the inference that, in the average of cases^about four years of
experience are essential to the development of teaching: skill to the point where it will he rated as superiorly com-
petent supervisors.
144 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
voiceless except in cities, where she lends herself automatically to a perennial agita-
tion for more salary.
MARRIED TEACHERS WOULD REWIRE BETTER CONDITIONS
If this situation can be corrected at all, it must be as above stated, namely, by
making a life career of teaching possible and attractive to successful women. Under
present conditions it is not probable that many teachers of the kind desired would con-
tinue to teach after their marriage even if the opportunity were given. This is de-
cidedly in their favor and against present conditions. Children need strong, rested,
and clear-seeing teachers ; instead of which the present regime is likely to produce
teachers who are inclined to weariness, nervous tension, and depression. A part-time
plan for teachers would be harder to carry out, but the actual results would undoubt-
edly be a great gain. Better forty positions with a short day for skilled, experienced,
and finely productive married women, whose ability has made them a permanent and
recognized asset in the community, than a fluctuating, overworked group of twenty
young apprentices of doubtful intentions and divided interests.
EFFECT OF PROLONGED TENURE ON TRAINING
The effect of this point of view upon the professional curriculum is apparent. Many
normal schools to-day herd their students, much as many superintendents herd their
teachers. The demand presses; all sorts of material must be utilized; each teacher
produced is presumably short-lived so far as service goes and must soon be replaced.
There prevail, therefore, all the usual evils of mass production for the temporary
repair of excessive wastage : slighted preparation, poor selection, hurried processes, lax
inspection, and much false branding of finished goods. Given the new motive, how-
ever, each training agency could seriously set out to make genuine teachers. A dis-
criminating choice of students, a deliberate, ripened training, and a thorough testing
of the product would be worth while in preparing a teacher to face her peculiar pro-
fession of school and home education as a man faces medicine or law. The necessity
of longer training for longer service would be manifest; fewer new teachers would be
required; more could be expected of the profession itself in the form of continuous
and organized self-criticism and growth.
3. Prescription versus Election of Studies
A striking difference between the state normal schools of Missouri and the city
training schools of St. Louis and Kansas City is the closely prescribed programs of
the latter as compared with the largely elective programs of the former. Various rea-
sons are assigned in explanation of this difference. The city training schools prepare
for a clearly defined type of service. The students will presently teach a prescribed
and uniform elementary curriculum based upon uniform textbooks. Their preparation,
PRESCRIPTION VERSUS ELECTION 145
consequently, calls for a very specific treatment of the field. The state normal schools,
on the other hand, endeavor to prepare for high school teaching as well as for service
in elementary schools, and in the preparation even of elementary teachers, they have
believed that the logic of their situation required them to aim toward an adaptability
that would enable their graduates to meet varying situations. It is not clear, however,
that this need of ensuring elasticity has been the primary reason for the normal schools'
adoption of the elective system. The interlocking organization of the one-year, two-
year, three-year, and four-year curricula, referred to later,1 provides for a gradual ac-
cumulation of credits representing work which may transform a teacher of elemen-
tary subjects into a high school specialist. For this purpose as well as to allow for the
intermittent attendance encouraged by the state schools, the elective system offers the
simplest plan for organizing a program of studies. Beyond this, and perhaps still more
influential in determining the procedure, has been a somewhat unreflective imitation
by the normal schools of the curriculum policies characteristic of the liberal-arts col-
leges. The normal schools, it is true, have sought to justify this imitation, in so far as
the elective system is concerned, by insisting that the needs of the individual are al-
ways of paramount consideration. If this principle could be effectively offset by a com-
plementary postulate that would safeguard the needs of the service for which these
individuals are being prepared, there could be no objection to it; but to make these
adjustments involves difficulties quite as serious as those that are encountered in ad-
ministering a prescribed curriculum in away that will not do injustice to the individ-
ual. The typical student programs cited elsewhere2 abundantly testify that the Mis-
souri normal schools have not succeeded in solving the problem in a satisfactory man-
ner. A final factor in determining the adoption of the elective system has been the
desire of the normal schools to have their courses articulate closely with those of the
universities, to which many of their students expect to go.
DEFINITION OF PRESCBIFTION
When the question is considered from a purely objective standpoint, however, it
is fair to ask whether, as a matter of general policy, prescribed curricula are not both
theoretically and practically preferable either to the elective system or to the group-
requirement system for institutions that prepare teachers. Under the assumption
that the institution is really what it purports to be,— namely, a strictly professional
school, preparing for clearly defined and fairly well-standardized types of public
service, — is it not advisable to lay down systematic programs of instruction and
training, each of which shall comprise the materials that experience has shown to be
most clearly related to the specific field of service that the student proposes to
enter? This does not mean that deviations from the prescribed curricula should not
be permitted ; it means rather that these deviations should be clearly consistent with
the needs both of the individual and of the service, that they should be subject
1 See page 162. * See pages 411-417.
146 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
neither to the whim of the student nor to the accident of class hours, and that they
should be permitted only with the approval of an official or a committee acting under
rules laid down by faculty action. With such a provision, carefully and sincerely ad-
ministered, the prescriptive system would acquire much of bhe elasticity that is the
important advantage of the elective plan, and would avoid its evils. The more serious
disadvantages of the elective and group-requirement systems may be summarized as
follows.
THEORY OF " EQUIVALENCE" OF COURSES FOR PROFESSIONAL PURPOSES
Both systems imply an equivalence of educational values among different courses
which on their face are not equivalent in their value as preparation for specific types
of teaching. It is in this connection that the weakness of the group system is most
apparent. The natural sciences, for example, frequently constitute a single group,
and a student is required to take so many semester hours of "science." In the eyes
of those who make this indiscriminate requirement, it is apparently not the content
or subject-matter of the science courses that is important; the "discipline" of scien-
tific method is the ostensible end sought. From this point of view, all of the sciences
are assumed to stand upon the same level. But in the preparation of teachers for the
specific work of imparting instruction, the nature of the subject-matter can never be
the relatively unimportant factor that the theory of formal discipline would assume,
and the particular sciences that are to find a place in a teacher- training curriculum
cannot so nonchalantly be made a minor consideration on the easy assumption that
"it is the training that counts," and that for purposes of training "one science is
just as good as another." Similar allotments of a stated number of hours in the so-
cial sciences, or even in the narrower field of history, are equally inadequate to the
needs of specific preparation for the work of teaching.
The inappropriateness of choice resulting from group election would of itself be
sufficient to condemn the system; but its case is still worse when it is remembered
that these group requirements are often mere compromises among contending aca-
demic departments, each of which zealously presses its own claims for recognition.
On this basis the outcome has relatively little educational value. Whatever may be
the evils of the system in tempting the instructor to offer "snap" courses, it is clear
that the prescribed program removes all such inducement. It also has the effect of
concentrating the teacher's entire attention on improving the quality of the regular
standard courses for which he is responsible instead of placing a premium upon vari-
ety which is bound to be more or less experimental in character.
THE PROFESSIONAL STUDENT NOT QUALIFIED TO ELECT
Both systems imply a mistaken trust in the ability of the relatively immature stu-
dent to determine not only what is best for him as an individual but, in institutions
preparing for public service, what is best for the service — a far more delicate and
PRESCRIPTION VERSUS ELECTION 147
important matter. Even when choices are subject to the approval of faculty advisers,
the advice is not infrequently influenced by partisan or departmental motives that
tend to overshadow the fundamental needs both of the individual and of the schools
in which he will teach; while in some cases the advice is purely perfunctory, the stu-
dent really electing subjects as he chooses or under the adventitious controls repre-
sented by one's favorite class-hours, the popularity or unpopularity of certain in-
structors, or even the place of the subject in the schedule of final examinations. If,
however, curricula are prescribed with minute care and are subject to change only
by approval of an official or a committee acting under carefully formulated rules,
there is every likelihood that principles of educational value will be much more ade-
quately reflected, both in the prescriptions themselves and in the substitutions that
are permitted.
SEQUENCE DIFFICULT TO MAINTAIN
A most serious objection to the elective and group systems is the difficulty in pre-
serving the essential sequences in courses. An attempt is often made to meet this need
by stating prerequisites, altho in the Missouri normal schools these are not substan-
tial either as stated in the catalogues or as enforced in practice. The prescriptive pol-
icy, tempered as has been suggested by the permission of changes under stated rules,
places primary emphasis upon sequence and order, and then examines each claim for
exemption or substitution upon its own individual merits.
Is THE ATTITUDE OF THE STUPENT IMPROVED BY ELECTION?
There are certain alleged advantages of the elective and group systems that merit
attention in this connection. It has been urged that under the elective system the
attitude of the student is more favorable; he believes that his studies are of his own
choosing, and consequently, it is asserted, his work is more whole-hearted and thor-
ough. A careful search was made for evidences of greater interest and enthusiasm
among the students of the state normal schools as compared with the students of the
city training schools with their rigidly prescribed curricula. If there were any differ-
ences, they were distinctly not to the disadvantage of the city training schools, — altho
it cannot be asserted that the policy of prescription had in any sense a causal influ-
ence. Interest, enthusiasm, and hard work are elements that, in so far as they depend
upon the exercise of the student's choice, are the product of his initial decision as to
the goal at which he hopes to arrive. A student chooses whether he will study law or
medicine, or whether he will become a primary or an upper grade teacher, and works
more happily when bis goal inspires him; but with his choice once made, any clear-
headed professional student would rather undertake the studies that a competent
authority tells him he needs than wander unguided thru a program whose values he
cannot possibly predetermine.
148 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
EFFECT OF ELECTION ON "INITIATIVE""
A second supposed merit of the elective and group systems is really a specific ex-
pression of an educational doctrine accepted by many as axiomatic. Freedom, it is
asserted, promotes the development of that valuable quality known as " initiative,"
while prescription with its restrictions tends to choke originality and to predispose
the student to a more or less blind acceptance of authority. No one would deny the
general validity of this position, but much confusion is likely to result from an undis-
criminating application of the implied principle to the work of education. Each of
the words " freedom,"" "initiative,"" "originality,1" and "restrictions" may be applied to
situations having diametrically opposite meanings, and there will always be a temp-
tation to profit by these possibilities of equivocation, especially in utilizing the prin-
ciple to support loose and careless practices or to cloak the unwillingness of those
in authority to assume a corresponding measure of responsibility. Freedom that the
truth has made is confused with mere lack of direction; "initiative and originality"
in putting together a bizarre program of studies is substituted for aggressive mental
comprehension under competent leadership, and administrative laziness makes it an
august pedagogical principle to allow students to do as they please. It is clear that
any principle, however valid in the abstract, must be applied with caution whenever
it can be used easily to conceal or to sanction the path of least resistance. As a mat-
ter of fact, there is no evidence that carefully constructed and intelligently adminis-
tered curricula of the prescribed type in technical and professional schools exert a
deleterious influence upon initiative and originality, and there is an abundance of
evidence that system, order, and a willingness to undergo discipline are likely to go
hand in hand with constructive ability of the highest character.1
Whatever may be the virtues of the elective and group-requirement systems in
institutions of general education, their place in professional and technical education
would seem to be narrowly limited. As an administrative device for facilitating the
construction of individual curricula, the group system especially may have legitimate
uses, but even here the many advantages of definitely prescribed curricula made up of
carefully selected and well-articulated courses would amply compensate for the diffi-
culties that are likely to be encountered in their construction and administration.
4. The Extent and Criteria of Curriculum Differentiation
In constructing a comprehensive program of studies for the professional pz*epara-
tion of teachers two important questions relating to differentiation arise: (1) How
are curricula for teachers to be differentiated in general from curricula that are non-
vocational or liberal in their purpose? and (2) What different kinds of specific curric-
ula are essential to a preparation of public school teachers that will adequately meet
current needs?
xCf. an illuminating article by E,L. Thorndike, '* Education for Initiative and Originality," Teachers College Record,
November, 1916.
DIFFERENTIATION 149
a. INCIDENTAL versus ORGANIZED PROFESSIONAL TRAINING
Opinion relative to the first question is divided between (a) those who maintain
that the best training for a teacher is essentially a "general1' education with emphasis
upon the subject-matter to be taught, but with added courses in educational theory
and practice, and (6) those who hold that the curriculum should be constructed
throughout, academic and professional subjects alike, with a view to the needs of those
who are planning to teach. The former point of view has naturally been emphasized
by the liberal-arts colleges that have recognized the importance of preparing teach-
ers; the latter point of view is characteristic of certain, altho by no means all, of the
normal schools.
That a teacher should have the broadest possible foundation in scholarship has
never been seriously disputed, but there are varying opinions as to the meaning of
"broad scholarship," and the particular meaning that any one person gives to the
term is likely to be misinterpreted and exaggerated by others. Those who plead for
extensive information as an essential basis for all teaching are likely to be accused of
favoring a superficial acquaintance with many different fields of knowledge, while those
who lay the emphasis upon depth and accuracy are met with the charge of narrowness
and pedantry. There has been, and still is, among college faculties a decided prejudice
against the normal schools for leaning toward the superficial, while principals of high
schools have not hesitated to accuse college-trained teachers of having no interest
save in the advanced phases of their own specialties. In each case the criticism, while
justified in particular instances, has usually been generalized to an unwarrantable
extent, but the situation that actually exists reveals the need of a more definite
agreement as to the kind and amount of " broad scholarship " that a teacher should
possess.
We have already concluded that the specific preparation for teaching should be
based upon a general or liberal education equivalent to that represented by graduation
from a four-year high school. We may assume that this implies an acquaintance with
the chief departments of knowledge as these are presented in a secondary school. If a
curriculum for teachers involves only two years of study beyond the high school, it is
clear that the bulk of this time must be given to the intensive mastery of the specific
subject-matter to be taught and to the essential minimum of work in educational the-
ory and practice. But the specific subject-matter that is taught in the elementary school
is by no means narrow in its scope, and the courses presenting this subject-matter
assuredly need not be lacking in the breadth and enrichment characteristic of liberal
studies.
This point of view, which some American normal schools have recognized in
theory, and which a few have successfully reflected in their practice, merits serious
consideration. Is it possible so to organize the content of elementary school studies
that normal school students undertaking these courses shall not merely "review"
previously gained knowledge, but rather acquire what will be substantially " new
150 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
views " of familiar matter as well as much genuinely fresh knowledge ? Can such
courses induce a quality of mental effort and ensure a degree of mental growth equiva-
lent to that which is implied in the courses now recognized as of collegiate texture?
ARITHMETIC
In arithmetic, for example, the teacher needs to " know " the process of long divi-
sion, let us say, in the sense of understanding clearly the reasons for the several
steps involved, and of having a reasonable degree of skill in applying the process
quickly and accurately. Beyond this, however, he should understand the mathemat-
ical logic of the process ; he should know how it evolved, and particularly the dis-
advantages of the more cumbrous processes that preceded it. He thus acquires a
quite new view of something with which he already has, in his own judgment, a con-
siderable measure of familiarity. His added knowledge may not include materials
which, as a teacher of elementary arithmetic, he will pass on to his pupils, but it
will deepen his appreciation of the importance of what he does pass on, and it will
clarify his own understanding of the process itself. An analogous treatment may well
be accorded to every topic represented in the subject. Even the primary teacher, strug-
gling with the development of the simplest number concepts and processes, will find
new insight and inspiration for her work in a knowledge of primitive number systems
and of the steps that the race traversed in its development of the existing system of
notation and numeration. If to these genetic studies one adds relevant excursions into
the psychology of number, especially in connection with tests and scales, it is clear
that a course of distinctly advanced character and quality is obtained, all of which
serves the teacher's ultimate need. In treating the more advanced topics, emphasis laid
upon industrial applications, the construction and use of commercial devices, and sim-
ilar topics, brings a significant extension of one's range of knowledge. The equivalence
of such a course to algebra or solid geometry is irrelevant; in respect to the enlarge-
ment of one's intellectual horizon, its contribution is evident, and its appropriateness
for the purpose in view need not detract from its value.
OTHER ELEMENTARY SUBJECTS
Similarly a course in literature for children offered to prospective teachers should
involve much more than a study of literature in the form in which little children
will assimilate it. The very fact that many of the poems and stories of childhood are
among the oldest and most persistent products of the world's culture suggests at
once the wealth of material available for a teachers' course in this subject. It goes
without saying that a teacher can use this literature with children more effectively
if he knows its antecedents and origins, and consequently realizes that he is dealing,
not with trivial materials valuable simply because they are adapted to immature
minds, but rather with a significant and precious human heritage. Certainly in its
DIFFERENTIATION 151
cultural quality a course of this type may easily be made to compare favorably with
any collegiate course in mythology or folk-lore,
The opportunities in connection with history are equally numerous. The elementary
school teacher needs a basis in historical knowledge much broader than that which
the historical content of the elementary program represents, A part of this basis will
be furnished by the courses in history that he has completed in the high school;
but beyond this, there must be a comprehensive and illuminating study of the ele-
mentary materials themselves, involving a knowledge of movements and causal rela-
tionships which could not be included in the elementary program, but which will aid
in making elementary teaching effective; and involving, too, a much more serious
effort to make the past really " live" than the ordinary college course usually attempts.
Thus the ideal course in history provided for prospective elementary school teachers
will differ from the ordinary college course dealing with the same materials, but it
should be no less replete with enlarging experience, and certainly no less worthy of
collegiate rating.
The possibility of organizing collegiate courses for teachers in such subjects as
geography, nature study, and physiology and hygiene is even more apparent than in
connection with arithmetic, literature, and history. In each case there is a distinct
need of a course or of several courses differentiated in important respects from cor-
responding courses organized from the point of view of the typical liberal-arts col-
lege, but in each case, also, it is apparent that the essential differentiations do not
mean that the differentiated courses shall cease to embody the accepted principle
that all teachers should possess a substantial basis in genuine scholarship.
HIGH SCHOOL SUBJECTS
We have been speaking hitherto of courses for prospective elementary school
teachers. Will the preparation of high school teachers involve a similar need of sub-
ject-matter courses differentiated from courses in the liberal-arts colleges? It may
be urged that as regards both the materials themselves and their organization for
teaching, the high school courses in literature, the sciences, mathematics, and his-
tory do not differ essentially from collegiate courses in the same subjects. Indeed,
except in the case of mathematics, the ordinary subjects of the high school program
may be found under the same names on the collegiate list, while the more advanced
collegiate courses are in many cases only expansions of topics treated more briefly
in the introductory courses. Thus it might be inferred that the typical collegiate
courses would form an adequate preparation for teaching the corresponding subjects
in the high school. To this it must be objected that the organization of its courses
on the collegiate model has been one of the most serious weaknesses of the high
school, that modern tendencies in high school development emphasize a type of or-
ganization more closely correlated with the needs and abilities of secondary pupils,
152 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
and that, consistently with this tendency, special courses for prospective high school
teachers should be differentiated to a very appreciable degree from corresponding
courses in liberal-arts colleges. There is, in fact, an urgent need for specific courses
of collegiate character covering the subject-matter of the secondary program, much
as the courses described above are conceived to cover the subject-matter of the ele-
mentary program. The high school teacher of mathematics, for example, should
surely undertake mathematical studies well in advance of those that he proposes to
teach, and it is quite possible that the content of these advanced courses should be
modified by the fact that he is to teach high school mathematics. But in any case
he needs courses in elementary algebra and in plane geometry which will not only
refresh his mind with regard to elementary principles and processes, but will also
give him a much deeper and broader conception of principles and a much more facile
mastery of processes than his earlier secondary course could possibly give. Such
courses should emphasize the historical development of these elementary processes,
and they should lay stress particularly upon the possibilities and methods of illu-
minating instruction by the applications of elementary mathematics to a wide vari-
ety of scientific, technical, and industrial problems.
SPECIAL CURRICULA IN NORMAL SCHOOLS FOR HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS
If it is true that the subject-matter for prospective high school teachers should be
differentiated from the corresponding subject-matter taught from the standpoint of
the liberal-arts college, there may be a distinct place for the preparation of high school
teachers in at least some of the normal schools, and certainly for the development of
differentiated teachers colleges in the universities. On the other hand, if subject-mat-
ter courses do not need to be modified for the preparation of high school teachers, a
policy which favors the extensive use of the normal schools for this purpose implies
that much of the work of these schools looking toward the training of high school
teachers will be a duplication of the work of the liberal-arts colleges. Inasmuch as
certain normal schools are now engaged in the preparation of high school teachers, it
would seem advisable to emphasize clearly in some of these normal schools the prin-
ciple of differentiation referred to above, — that is, definitely modifying all courses
with reference to their bearing upon the problem of high school teaching. The pro-
ducts of these schools could then be compared with the products of the liberal-arts
colleges and of other normal schools in which the subject-matter courses are replicas
of those offered in the liberal-arts colleges. How far the present organization of sub-
ject-matter courses in the Missouri normal schools will serve the purposes of such
a test is a question that will be considered in a later section of this report.1
1 See pages 228 ff.
DIFFERENTIATION 153
ADVANTAGE OF DIFFERENTIATION
The great advantage of the differentiations proposed is that they permit the con-
struction of a thoroughly integrated curriculum which, in its turn, serves to concen-
trate all of the work of the student upon a unified problem. Whenever such concen-
tration is possible it is obviously the method of educational organization that will
yield the largest returns. When a student enters upon a program of studies that is
clearly professional, the time has come for this essential concentration. A teacher as
a teacher needs what we know as the liberal studies, but just because his need is a pro-
fessional need, the pursuit of these studies by the prospective teacher may profit-
ably, and should logically, differ in important respects from their pursuit by students
who necessarily regard them from anon-professional point of view. A student of chem-
istry, for example, if he proposes to be a textile expert, fixes his attention primarily
on the processes as they may be of use to him in a future career; his business is to
have the formulae at his command. If, however, he be intending to teach chemistry, his
business is to watch also the organization and sequence of material as it affects his own
learning process in order that he may help others to master it with a minimum of
effort; he seeks to comprehend the related fields as thoroughly as possible in order to
make the central course suggestive and significant; as a prospective teacher he under-
takes consciously to analyze and assimilate the learner's whole need and point of view.
b. DEGREE OF DIFFERENTIATION REQUIRED
The second problem relative to differentiation has to do with the number of spe-
cialized curricula that are essential in a comprehensive system for the preparation of
teachers. Present practice distinguishes sharply between the preparation of high school
teachers and the preparation of elementary teachers ; and, with less vigor, in the prepa-
ration of high school teachers as among the various subjects or groups of cognate sub-
jects. There seems, further, to be a general agreement that, in the preparation of ele-
mentary teachers, the specific training for kindergarten and primary work should be
provided for in a separate curriculum. A third type of differentiation, already well
recognized, provides separate curricula for prospective teachers and supervisors of
the so-called "special subjects," — agriculture, drawing, household arts, industrial
arts, music, and physical education.
It is clear, then, that the general principle of specific training for specific types of
teaching service already has a substantial basis both in theory and in practice. In two
large and important divisions of the service, however, this principle has not as yet
been generally applied. We refer, first, to elementary teaching beyond the first and
second grades, and, second, to the administrative work represented by the elementary
principalship, the high school principalship, and the superintendency. In a third
division of the service — namely rural school teaching — the principle of specific
preparation has been recognized, but rather from the point of view of immediate
expediency than from a clear acceptance of rural school teaching as a distinctive field.
CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
MIDDLE AND UPPER GRADES STILL FORM A SINGLE FIELD
If present practice correctly reflects underlying theory, it is apparently believed
that the professional preparation of all candidates for elementary teaching beyond the
primary grades is adequately accomplished by a single undifferentiated curriculum.
This point of view has undoubtedly been determined largely by factors that are pri-
marily administrative in their character. The immature and inexperienced teachers
entering graded school systems have been assigned first to the middle grades, particu-
larly to the third and fourth. Those who are successful here, and who remain in the
system, have been fairly certain of "promotion" to the first grade or to the upper
grades. The specialization of preparation for primary work has modified this situation
in some measure, altho teachers who have not had this specialized preparation are
still frequently transferred from the intermediate to the primary grades. In general,
however, the middle grades have come to be looked upon as the training ground of
the novice, and in consequence any proposal to differentiate as between intermediate
grade teachers and tipper grade teachers in the construction of normal school curricula
runs sharply counter to an administrative practice that has developed to a point where
it is virtually "taken for granted.""
The extent to which this situation must be considered in any discussion of profes-
sional curricula is made plain in the statistics showing the distribution of teachers in
the various elementary grades in respect to age, experience, and salary. Tables pre-
sented in the report1 of the Illinois School Survey, based upon data from £670 teachers
in the graded town and city elementary schools of the state, indicate that the median
age of teachers in the lower intermediate grades is ten years lower than the median
age of upper grade teachers (VII and VIII) and two years lower than the median age
of teachers in the primary grades (I and II). Furthermore the median age of teachers
in the higher intermediate grades (V and VI), while somewhat above that of third
grade and fourth grade teachers and of the primary teachers, is still significantly lower
than that of the upper grade teachers. Corresponding differences exist among these
groups in respect to experience and present salary.2
The situation in Missouri is not essentially different. The following table, for ex-
ample, shows a clear tendency in both St. Louis and Kansas City to place the more
immature and inexperienced teachers in the middle grades, reserving the primary and
upper grades for the teachers who have served their apprenticeship and demonstrated
their fitness for what are looked upon as the more difficult and more responsible types
of work:
1 The Illinois School Survey, Bloommgton, 1917, pages 11T £f.
2 The comparisons are shown in the following? table ;
Teachers in Rooms Median Median Years Median
representing Grades Age Experience Salary
I, I and II, II 28 9 $576-$625
II and III, III, III and IV 26 6 526-576
IV,IVandV,V 26 7 576-625
V and VI, VI, VI and VII 80 10 626-675
VII, VII and VIII, VIII 36 15 676-725
DIFFERENTIATION
155
Grade
Kindergarten
1st grade
3d grade
3d grade
4th grade
5th grade
6th grade
Tth grade
8th grade1
Median Age of
Teachers
St. Louis Kansas City
35
28
31
36
26
25
26
26
26
28
29
33
30
36
31
40
41
i
Median Years
Experience
St. Louis Kansas City
12 4
10( + ) 14
8 8
6 8
7 10
10 13
Salary Range
Middle 60% of Teachers
St. Louis Kansas City
$801-$1000
751- 1100 701- 1000
751- 1100 751- 1000
751- 1100
951- 1100
801- 1000
901- 1000
951- 1000
20
18
i
951- 1100
951- 1200 1001- 1050
1001- 1300 1
MENTAL AND PHYSICAL CONSIDERATIONS WABRANT DIFFERENTIATION
We have referred to administrative expediency as the primary factor determining
this anomalous position of the intermediate grades. Certainly educational principles
could hardly be advanced in its support. The mental and physical characteristics of
children between the ages of eight and twelve differentiate this period sharply both
from the preceding school period, between the ages of six and eight, and from the
following period of adolescence, and clearly indicate that the educational treatment of
children during these years involves specialized problems that should not be confused
with the problems of either early childhood or adolescence. This conclusion is cer-
tainly justified by the evidence already available, altho in general the period has been
almost as seriously neglected in theory and in investigation as in school practice.
The work of the elementary school, as at present constituted, therefore, falls into
three well-marked divisions, each coinciding with fairly definite "nodes" in the men-
tal and physical development of the child. One should no more expect identity in the
qualifications needed for success in teaching the fourth grade and the eighth grade, or
the third grade and the seventh grade, than one expects identity in the qualifications
requisite for success in primary teaching and eighth grade teaching, or for success in
sixth grade teaching and high school teaching. The differences involved are neither
superficial nor negligible; they are vital distinctions that inhere in the very nature
of child development itself, and should be recognized by specific treatment in cur-
ricula constructed for the purpose. This done, the present practice of recruiting the
upper grade positions from the ranks of successful intermediate grade teachers would
necessarily be abandoned. Intermediate grade work would acquire, the same dignity
and status as a recognized field for specialization that primary work and upper grade
work already enjoy. The upper grade positions would be filled by the appointment
of normal school graduates who had similarly made a special study of upper grade
problems, and the marked discrepancies as to age, salary, and experience between
eighth grade teachers and intermediate grade teachers would disappear.
* The elementary schools of Kansas City do not include the eighth grrade, and the sixthand seventh grades become
in consequence the "upper grades."
156 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
OBJECTIONS TO DIFFERENTIATION
The arguments against this extension of the principle of differentiation deserve seri-
ous consideration. Many will urge that it would be disadvantageous as compared with
the present arrangement in that mature and experienced teachers now in charge of the
upper grades would give place to immature and inexperienced teachers who would
much better start with the third, fourth, or fifth grades and then work up into the
more responsible positions. But it is this assumption that the higher grades are essen-
tially more responsible positions that does the mischief. Certainly there would seem
to be little justification for the fact that the eighth grade teachers in St. Louis are as
a group fifteen years older than intermediate grade teachers, and have back of them
twice the experience of the latter group, unless it is that these older and more expe-
rienced teachers are needed at the end of the elementary school course in order to cor-
rect the defects due to less expert teaching in the middle grades.1 The provision of spe-
cific curricula for the preparation of intermediate grade teachers, by placing the work
of these grades upon a professional basis, would tend to correct this condition, just as
specific curricula for upper grade teaching would largely offset the lack of experience
on the part of young teachers there.
CHOICE OF SEEVICE DIFFICULT
A second argument against the proposal to specialize intermediate grade teaching
emphasizes the difficulty of making a choice among different types of service at or
near the beginning of the normal school training. Students fresh from the high schools,
it is urged, will have but small basis for determining whether they are best fitted
for one or another of the three types of elementary service. This objection, however,
loses much of its force when it is recalled that the principle of differentiated training
is already accepted. In entering many normal schools now, students must decide
between the curriculum for primary teachers and the general curriculum represent-
ing the remaining grades of the elementary school, and students commit themselves
to high school work, and make their decisions regarding the subject or subjects of
special study, long before they have tried themselves in practice. In these cases there
is little evidence that this necessity of making a choice fairly early in the period of
professional training works hardships that are in any sense commensurate with the
advantages that inhere in specific preparation for a relatively narrow range of ser-
vice. Finally, an institution for the preparation of teachers may well provide for a
term or a semester of common courses before differentiation begins, thus enabling
the school to enlighten the student as to the character of the differentiated curricula,
and otherwise to help him in making a wise choice.
1 It should be remembered that few eighth grade teachers in St. Louis have administrative responsibilities; practi-
cally all schools are in charge of supervising principals.
DIFFERENTIATION 157
TOO SPECIALIZED
A third objection to the proposal is based upon the advantage of having every
teacher of the elementary school somewhat familiar with the work of all grades. This
advantage is not to be questioned, but as an argument it holds against the differen-
tiations already recognized just as strongly as it would hold against the proposed
additional differentiations. It remains a stubborn fact that two years1 time is totally
insufficient to give a teacher adequate preparation for teaching at every point in the
elementary system. A teacher can in that time, however, acquire a reasonable facility in
handling two or three grades well. If by subsequent extension courses, or better by pro-
longed initial training, more can be done, it is doubtless desirable to extend a teach-
er's practical knowledge over a considerable range. Even so, it is a serious question
whether the entire elementary field is not altogether too large for the random prac-
tice of one person, however well trained. The superintendent who desires that a novice
be trained for all the grades is looking for an administrative convenience coached to
"fit in" anywhere at once and expected to acquire real training thru experience. He
has no idea of utilizing the teacher's practical versatility after she is once placed, hence
her varied training does little to offset the lack of intensive acquaintance with her real
work. The need at present in every case is, first, for courses common to all specialized
curricula, dealing with the organization of the public school system as a complete edu-
cational unit, and, second, for an especial effort in the construction of each specialized
curriculum to give the prospective teacher an intimate acquaintance with the grades
immediately preceding and following those in which the chief service is expected to
lie. A primary teachers" curriculum, for example, should provide for a study of third
grade and fourth grade problems as well as for a more detailed study of the work of
the kindergarten, the first grade, and the second grade; the intermediate curriculum,
while emphasizing the specific problems of the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth grades,
should also furnish the student with a perspective of the primary and upper grade
programs; and the upper grade curriculum should neglect neither intermediate grade
work nor plinth grade work. But these overlappings should be designed in every case
for the especial purpose of enlightenment; they should not be expected to furnish
practical efficiency in the additional grades, — a result to be sought only in longer
training.
DIFFICUMT OF ADJUSTING SUPPLY AND DEMAND
A fourth and final objection points to the complicated problem of supply and
demand, and asks what assurance a teacher who pursues a specialized curriculum will
have of employment in his chosen field. Again, this argument would not affect the
proposed differentiations any more than it affects those now existing, unless it be as-
sumed that the upper grade curriculum will attract a disproportionate number of can-
didates, and that intermediate grade teaching will always be the least attractive. There
is, however, every reason to believe that a curriculum that really dignifies the work of
158 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
the intermediate grades will, with the gradual equalization of rewards, attract its due
proportion of candidates, and that the initial difficulties which may be involved in
the present lack of recognition will be offset largely by the more numerous opportuni-
ties for appointment. It should be said, further, that any system of highly differen-
tiated curricula implies, both in the schools and in the state's department of educa-
tion, a knowledge and control alike of candidates and of available teaching positions
considerably more complete than is now the case. Needs of individual schools and of
the state as a whole should be followed with sufficient care to enable the several train-
ing agencies to estimate with fair exactness about how many teachers of each type will
be required in a given year. This information can be obtained by any state, and if
properly utilized would reduce the inequalities of supply and demand to a minimum.
CHARACTER AND EXTENT OF LEGITIMATE DIFFERENTIATION OF TRAINING
A brief reference may be made to the type of differentiation desirable in these
specialized curricula for intermediate grade teachers. Following the suggestions made
above1 with regard to the organization of subject-matter courses for prospective
teachers, the first distinct need in the intermediate grade curriculum is for courses
that represent on the collegiate level the specific subjects of the intermediate pro-
gram. That most of these subjects differ considerably in materials and methods of
presentation from corresponding subjects of the seventh and eighth grades, a brief
study of any well-constructed elementary syllabus will quickly reveal. The prepara-
tion of the prospective teacher for dealing effectively with the instruction of the in-
termediate grades in history, for example, will involve an acquaintance particularly
with biographical materials, and with the concrete details of social life in Greece and
Rome, in mediaeval Europe, in England of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth
centuries, and in colonial America. It is not urged that the teacher should know only
this type of history, but inasmuch as the history taught in the intermediate grades
necessarily makes the largest use of materials of this type, the teacher of these grades
should "know" history from this point of view.
Corresponding differences in treatment are indicated in connection with the teach-
er's courses in geography. The intermediate grade teacher needs especially wealth and
accuracy of concrete information concerning the environment in which he is teaching
in order that he may lead the pupils who are just beginning the study of geography
from a knowledge of familiar things to an understanding of what is remote; and while
the course in intermediate geography cannot reflect the environment of every com-
munity in which the graduates of the school will teach, it can train the student in
the art of utilizing many types of environmental materials for educative purposes.
Beyond this the teacher of the intermediate grades should be well equipped with
accurate and concrete knowledge concerning the various peoples of the world, and
especially concerning domestic customs and child life. The upper grade teacher, on
1 See pages 149 ff.
DIFFERENTIATION 159
the other hand, will have to undertake a more thoroughly systematized presentation
of geographical materials in which causal relationships find an important place; his
preparation, then, will place the heavier emphasis upon commercial and industrial
geography, with especial attention to the fundamental principles that form the im-
portant geographical " controls."
In respect to arithmetic, the features that distinguish the two fields from each
other are confined chiefly to methods of teaching and concrete applications. It is,
indeed, in the organization of materials for teaching that the differentiations in all
of the subject-matter courses will be most sharply drawn. The distinctions should not
be rigid or artificial. Some courses may be profitably considered as constants in all
curricula for teachers; other courses may be offered to combined sections, or at least
without necessary segregation, for a part of the time, grouping students according
to their different curricula only whenever specialized treatment becomes essential.
With a limited purpose clearly fixed, significant elements of differentiation will be
suggested in abundance by further study of the distinctive characteristics of children
at the various stages of elementary education. It is expert familiarity with these finer
traits of a child's development and ability to turn them to his advantage that marks
the professional teacher.
Curricula so diversified as those that have been suggested must naturally be more
or less provisional ; they are, however, a consistent extension of a movement that has
in its inception been highly beneficial. The single curriculum plan has been appre-
ciably modified in this country by the general recognition of specialized training for
primary teachers. This movement toward differentiation has been notably successful
in raising the standards and enhancing the dignity of service in the primary grades,
and it is only reasonable to assume that a similar specialization of the other clearly
marked divisions of elementary teaching will have an analogous effect.
SPECIALIZED PREPARATION FOR ADMINISTRATION
The lack of adequate provisions for the specific preparation of superintendents and
principals is due to the interplay of several factors. In the first place the special-
ized study and investigation of administrative problems is a recent development,
having made little more than a beginning a decade ago. The materials for a special-
ized curriculum have therefore been meagre, until lately. In the second place, the
superintendency itself has not demanded so much in the way of specialized know-
ledge as in the way of personal qualifications, — tact, common-sense, and ability to
deal with men and women. With no objective methods of measuring the efficiency
of a school or a school system, the real professional qualifications of the adminis-
trative officer were matters that could not be clearly defined or emphasized. In the
third place, and largely as a consequence of these two factors, the tenure of the su-
perintendency has been and still is most insecure. The " life " of the average super-
intendent of schools in the Middle West in so far as continuous service in any one
160 CURRICULA : OUTSTANDING PROBLEMS
community is concerned was computed in 1914 to be four years.1 The present study
of conditions in Missouri shows that the typical superintendent in 1915 had at the
age of thirty-six served as superintendent in two different towns or cities, including
the one then employing him, and that the average of the periods of continuous ser-
vice was three years.2
The conditions that have kept school administration from a true professional
status, however, are rapidly passing. The applications of statistical methods to the
analysis of complicated problems of gradation and promotion of pupils, retardation
and elimination, the rating of teachers, and the measurement of achievements in
school subjects, as well as the gratifying advances in school sanitation, school ac-
counting, and the wider use of the school plant, have resulted in a large and essen-
tial body of knowledge already available for specific administrative courses. Such
courses are now among the most important offerings of university departments and
schools of education, but their organization with other types of material into formal
curricula has not as yet been seriously attempted. The preparation of school admin-
istrators has made rapid progress within the past five years, but the progress has
been confined chiefly to passing on the fruits of these recent developments to super-
intendents and principals already engaged in supervisory work. Curricula that will
formulate the strictly professional training of men and women for this work before
they assume supervisory positions seem to be the next step in this development.
SPECIALIZED PREPARATION FOB RURAL SCHOOL TEACHERS
Specialized curricula for rural school teachers are not uncommon in American
normal schools, but, as has been suggested, the differentiation has been determined
largely by the need of preparing immature students for temporary service in this
field rather than by a recognition of the field itself as worthy of extended, special-
ized treatment. In Missouri, for example, the "rural-certificate course" in the normal
schools is offered only on the secondary level. Indeed, the students of collegiate rank
who are preparing for rural school teaching in the normal schools of the United
States would probably not number five hundred all told, — yet the rural school ser-
vice itself, according to the Commissioner of Education, requires more than one hun-
dred thousand recruits each year !
The neglect by the normal schools of serious preparation for rural school teaching
is due primarily, of course, to the low status to which the rural school is at present
assigned. It is inconceivable that the schools in which more than one-half of the na-
tion's children receive all of their schooling will be permitted to continue upon this
low level of efficiency. When the people awaken to the fact that a large proportion
1 From an unpublished study of 590 superintendents by E. L. Lawson at the University of Illinois.
2 These figures are for one hundred forty-three superintendents in systems having first class high schools. In sys-
tems with second class schools the typical superintendent was thirty-four years old, and had held but one position
for two years. In systems with third class schools he was thirty years old and had held two positions for one year
each.
CURRICULA AS WHOLES 161
of the illiteracy and other evidences of educational deficiency revealed by the army
tests is due first and last to the weakness of the rural school, they will quickly find
a means of remedying the situation. Whatever remedy they adopt will depend for its
efficiency upon securing a mature, well-prepared, and relatively permanent body of
teachers for the rural service. The cost of such a reform will be negligible in compari-
son with the benefits involved.
For the preparation of such teachers, the normal schools should even now begin to
offer carefully constructed curricula, coordinate in every way with the curricula for
urban teachers. This would mean curricula that are based upon graduation from a
four-year high school, and that require for completion at least two full years of resi-
dence. Even a period of this length is all too brief for a preparation that should
be at once broader and more intensive than that required of teachers in the graded
elementary school or the urban high school. Two years, therefore, should be but a
temporary minimum. Ultimately, as has been suggested in an earlier section, the
preparation of the rural school teachers, like the preparation of urban elementary
teachers, should comprise not less than four years of specialized work beyond high
school graduation.
B. ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA IN THE STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS
CITY TRAINING SCHOOLS OF MISSOURI
1. Curricula as Wholes
a. GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL CURRICULA
It would be unjust to criticise in a captious spirit the normal schools either of
Missouri or of the country at large for failing to meet the ideals and standards set
forth in the preceding pages. Generally speaking, those responsible for normal school
development have sincerely and devotedly struggled to ensure from the meagre appro-
priations made for their institutions the largest possible service to the people. Dif-
ferences of opinion have naturally arisen as to the specific type of service that would
be most valuable. Some normal schools have centred their efforts on improving the
teaching in the lower schools, and they have consistently held to this as their func-
tion. Other normal schools have considered it their chief duty to assist in as many
ways as possible the individual students who have come to them for instruction.
PERSONAL WELFARE OF THE STUDENT PLACED ABOVE NEEDS OF THE SERVICE
Institutions of the latter type have, consciously or unconsciously, placed the wel-
fare of the individual above the welfare of the teaching service which the student
is presumably to enter. They have recognized, effectually if not explicitly, that this
service upon its lower levels does not offer attractive opportunities for a life career.
They have accepted the estimate that the public itself has placed upon public service
162 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
in the elementary schools, and especially in the rural schools, when it permits these
fields to remain barren of attractive rewards, open to low grade teaching ability, and
subject to the waste and inefficiency that go with the brief tenure of the average
teacher. Forsaking, therefore, the demands of the service engaging their students,
these schools have devoted themselves frankly to providing the education that would
give the students the careers they sought, relying on the theory that the person with
the greatest amount of general education would of necessity prove to be the best
teacher,
Any criticisms of the normal school for neglecting or belittling the field of elemen-
tary teaching should take into account this attitude on the part of the public. But
after giving to this factor all of the consideration that it deserves, there still remains
a conviction that these schools have acquiesced too readily in a situation the transfor-
mation of which one might justly assume to be their duty. It is their failure to assert
themselves in behalf of the massive but inchoate elementary and rural school systems
that strikes one most forcibly. They have been content to follow the tide of public
opinion rather than to assume a position of leadership in moulding and directing that
opinion. There is an unmistakable note of weakness in the following- extract from a
letter written by the president of a large middle western normal school concerning the
suggestion that the normal school faculties throughout the country might profitably
cooperate in the construction of something approaching "standardized" normal school
curricula :
"I may be wrong but I think these problems should be settled by the legisla-
tures and by the people thru the common school demands more than by any com-
mittee of faculties or experts that may be organized. Our present legislature is re-
modeling in some respects our educational system. This school will be compelled
to follow that remodeling in every particular if our graduates are to be recog-
nized and accepted in the service that the state expects."
That a normal school supported by the state must obey the mandates of the people
as expressed thru the legislature goes without saying. But it is quite as true that it
should have had a very considerable hand in inspiring and formulating those man-
dates.
"LADDER OF PROMOTION" IK MISSOURI NORMAL SCHOOLS
The state normal schools of Missouri, considered as a group, have followed the indi-
vidualistic policy. The general scheme of curriculum organization that was formally
adopted by a conference of the normal school presidents in 1914, tho actually in use
for many years preceding, is based upon the assumption that many, if not most, of the
students will not undertake two, three, or four consecutive years of study, but will
rather remain in residence for a relatively brief period, — perhaps a term, perhaps a
year, — then teach for a year or two, return to the school for another period of study,
again teach, and repeat this alternation until the desired certificate has been obtained,
CURRICULA AS WHOLES 163
or until the ambition to continue study has died away.1 In order to meet the demands
of this numerous group of students, the several curricula are so arranged as to form
a stairway from which one may gradually pass from rural school teaching to graded
school teaching, and thence to high school teaching, or to supervisory work. The vari-
ous "curricula" and the "advancement" that each offers over its predecessor are indi-
cated in the following diagram:
(The 120-hour curriculum,
preparing for administra-
tive and supervisory as
well as high school posi-
tions and leading to the
bachelor's degree
/The 90-hour curriculum,
Third College Year \ preparing for teaching in
(high schools
{The 60-hour curriculum,
preparing for teaching in
graded schools and small
high schools
(The 30-hour curriculum ;
a professional curriculum
on the collegiate level,
preparing for teaching in
rural schools and graded
schools
The "Rural Certificate'^
course, — a general high
school curriculum, with
certain professional
courses in the third and
fourth years. Prepares for
rural school teaching ,
It is evident that this ladder-like organization of the curricula is of very great ad-
vantage to the ambitious student who is unable to pursue his studies for four con-
secutive years. It not only incites him to a gradual and progressive accumulation of
credits, but it definitely "motivates" each successive stage of advancement in that
each curriculum increment when completed will both provide the means of earning
k money for further schooling and also pave the way educationally for the next step.
EFFECT UPON THE SCHOOLS UNFOKTITNATE
But while the arrangement may be advantageous to the individual student, its ulti-
mate consequences to the public schools are not so fortunate. It deliberately makes
the service of teaching on the earlier age levels and grade levels a means of promotion
to the later age and grade levels. Furthermore, each unit of study must aim to fulfil
1 For example, the Cape Girardeau catalogue (1916, pages 29 ftO'says apropos of the thirty-hour curriculum:
" This curriculum is arranged to equip students who cannot complete enough work for graduation with a suffi-
cient preparation to enable them to teach acceptably in public schools until they can continue their work to pre-
pare them better for teaching."
- Four-Tear Secondary Curriculum
164 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
two functions, (a) prepare the student to teach upon one of the earlier teaching levels,
and (6) prepare him for advanced study in a quite different field. One or the other of
these functions will inevitably be neglected. Certainly, preparation for high school
teaching is not adequately encompassed by adding one or two years to a curriculum
that is planned primarily for elementary school teaching, nor is it clear that the best
preparation for elementary teaching is that which, with one or two added years, will
be the best preparation for high school teaching. Admirably adapted tho the plan may
be to promote the interests of certain individuals, it seems indefensible from the stand-
point of the welfare and progress of the public school service.
This general tendency of the Missouri curricula to emphasize the needs of the
individual student at the expense of the service appears clearly upon a more minute
analysis of the arrangement of courses and the content of the various units of study
that comprise the sevei*al curricula. For convenience, this analysis will deal first with
the secondary curriculum and then with the four curricula of collegiate grade.
5. SECONDARY CURRICULUM LEADING TO THE RURAL CERTIFICATE
Each of the state normal schools of Missouri offers at least one secondary curric-
ulum of a professional character. This "Rural Certificate Course,1" which in its main
features is now common to the five schools, requires the completion of sixteen units of
secondary work. It was agreed upon at a conference of the normal school presidents
and the state superintendent of public instruction in June, 1916, and its provisions
went into effect on January 1, 1917. A curriculum calling for at least two years of
professional work above the elementary school had been offered since 1910. At most
of the schools this had gradually been extended to three years, or twelve secondary
units. The increase of the requirement to sixteen units is consequently to be looked
upon as a forward step. The new sixteen-unit curriculum was made practically identi-
cal with the curriculum for the high school teacher-training classes which had been
established and subsidized in 1913. Its essential features are as follows:1
" I . The following academic subj ects will be required : English, three units. Math-
ematics, two units (including arithmetic, algebra, and geometry). Agriculture,
one unit. High School Science, one unit (including biology, physics or physical
geography). History, two units (one of which must be American history and gov-
ernment). Industrial and Fine Arts, one unit.
*& The following professional studies will be required:
"(a) Subject-matter of the common branches, with emphasis upon method,
one unit.
"(6) The psychology of learning, or elementary psychology, one- third unit;
rural school problems,2 one-third unit; school management,2 one- third
unit (in all one unit).
u(c) Methods and observation, one unit.
1 State Report, 1916, page 342.
2 The names of these courses do not agree with the uniform terminology adopted by the Conference. See page 173.
CURRICULA AS WHOLES 165
"3. In addition, three electives, among which farm accounts, bookkeeping, short-
hand and typewriting, geography of commerce, general science, chemistry, do-
mestic science, domestic art, music, and physical education are recommended.
"4. It is recommended that students be required to complete eight units of high
school credit before taking any of the professional work."1
CONTRADICTORY AIMS
A teacher -training curriculum covering four years of secondary work may be con-
structed upon one or another of three plans: (1) it may be professionalized from the
outset ; (£) it may preserve the essential features of the general high school curriculum
for two or three years, reserving the third and fourth years or the fourth year alone
for concentrated professional work; (3) it may be essentially a general curriculum
throughout, introducing "reviews" and other professional courses wherever conven-
ient. At first glance, the above curriculum seems to follow the first plan, but one
is immediately led to ask why, if the curriculum is specifically for the preparation
of rural school teachers, such subjects as bookkeeping, shorthand, and typewriting
should be recommended as electives, with the possibility of giving them almost as
much time as is recommended for all of the professional work; or why physical train-
ing is elective rather than prescribed ; or why physiology and hygiene are neither
elective nor prescribed.
One gains the impression that these proposals do not reflect solely the needs of a
curriculum for the preparation of teachers. Such a curriculum, if offered on the sec-
ondary level, should certainly include liberal as well as professional courses; there
should be room for the algebra, the geometry, the unit of history over and above
American history, and the unit of science other than agriculture — altho with both
history and science, definite prescriptions would seem preferable to mere quantitative
provisions. But to combine in one curriculum two distinct groups of vocational ele-
ments is disconcerting. By no stretch of the imagination can bookkeeping, shorthand,
and typewriting be thought of as closely related to rural school teaching, nor do these
subjects possess the liberalizing and broadening values that would otherwise justify
their inclusion.
Trivial as it may seem, a situation of this sort is significant in the illustration that
it affords not only of the still markedly unprofessional character of rural school teach-
1 There are some interesting variations among the five schools in the way in which the conference suggestions for
the rural certificate curriculum are administered. Warrensburg offers only 21 units of electives, but otherwise pro-
vides a curriculum corresponding closely to the proposals above discussed. Cape Girardeau recommends 3 units of
history instead of 2, and 2 units of industrial and fine arts instead of 1 ; the recommended curriculum at Cape
Girardeau, therefore, calls for the completion of 18 rather than 16 units. Springfield reduces the electives to 1| units ;
requires 3& units of English, instead of 3; 2J units of history, instead of 2; and 1$ units of geography and 1 unit
of physiology and physics. The Springfield catalogue declares that the tabular statement of the curriculum ** meets
all of the requirements set up by the state superintendent and is what we think is the best possible preparation
for teaching in rural schools that can be made in a four years' high school course. ..." Maryville offers no free elec-
tives, adds J unit to the recommended requirements in English, history, and the fine and industrial arts, and
triples the requirements in science. (Data and quotations given will be found in the respective catalogues for 1917
with the exception of Maryville, for which the catalogue of 1916 was used, no later catalogue having been published
at that school.)
166 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
ing, but again of the tendency of the normal school to protect the individual from
attempting to make a career in a field that offers no career. In effect it says to the
student: "Rural school teaching is a thankless job; yet it may be made a stepping-
stone to something else. We advise you, while preparing for it, to learn stenography
and typewriting in case something better should turn up in these fields."
SECONDARY PROFESSIONAL CURRICULA SHOULD BE ABOLISHED
The present rural certificate curriculum, then, altho it constitutes in many respects
a distinct advance over its predecessors, is essentially a "compromise measure," as all
attempts to construct a professional curriculum upon a purely secondary basis are
likely to be ; compromises as between the claims of general and vocational courses,
or compromises among various types of vocational opportunity. As set forth else-
where,1 there should soon be no place for professional study on the secondary level,
and no need for making a choice of a profession before the high school course has been
completed. The level of rural school teaching can and should be raised to the point
where certification will not be granted for this work unless the candidate has had
some professional training beyond the high school. But the normal schools should
not wait for this advance in the standards of certification before they abandon their
secondary professional courses. They have made a notable step forward in placing the
rural certificate curriculum upon a four-year basis, and in recommending that no pro-
fessional courses in this curriculum be taken before the third year, thus providing
for the professional studies a background of at least eight units of general secondary
preparation. It would be advisable immediately to require twelve units of secondary
work as a basis for these studies, thus concentrating all of the professional work in
the fourth year and giving this year exclusively to the professional work. Then at a
definitely stated time, — say 19S3, — the professional courses could be advanced still
another year, placing them upon a fully collegiate basis. Another advance should
make two years of professional work beyond the high school an irreducible minimum
of preparation for the serious responsibilities of rural school teaching, and ulti-
mately, when far better salaries can be paid to elementary teachers, all curricula should
be extended to four years.
c. COLLEGIATE CURRICULA OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
It will be recalled that the four collegiate curricula of the state normal schools
constitute an educational ladder in that each curriculum prepares for its successor
while at the same time it provides professional training and recognition in the form
of a certificate which may enable the student to teach until he has saved enough
money to go on with his normal school work. The necessities that this general pol-
icy imposes on the school in the detailed organization of its collegiate curricula are
clearly apparent in the paucity of prescriptions and the abundance of elective privi-
1 See pages 128 ff.
CURRICULA AS WHOLES 167
leges, even in the curricula that cover only one or two years. The tabular summary
which follows suggests the lengths to which this scheme of elections is carried, as
well as the variations among the several schools ; the data are summarized from the
catalogues of 1917 (announcements for 1917-18), except in the case of Maryville,
where the catalogue for 1916 was used.
Kirksmlle Warrensburg Cape Gfirardeau Springfield Marymlk
Hours Hours Hours Hours Hours
30-Hour Curricula
Specified Courses 10 10 18 10 20
Restricted Elections1 10 2 — 93 20 10*
Free Elections 10 206 3 — —
60-Hour Curricula
Specified Courses 15 20 24 32|7 40
Restricted Elections1 37J 17J 24 25 —
Free Elections TJ m* 12 2*7 20
90-Hour Curricula
Specified Courses 17| 25 26 42i7
Restricted Elections1 42J 47 J 52 45
Free Elections 30 17J 12 %¥
120-Hour Curricula
Specified Courses 1TJ 25 34 42J7 45
Restricted Elections1 47J 42J 78 75 60
Free Elections 55 524 8 2JT 15
NOT TRUE CURRICULA
It is clear that the groupings of studies in all of the schools except Springfield are
not curricula in the true sense of the term; they are rather large program patterns
from which individual curricula may be constructed. This plan of organization again
expresses the tendency of the normal schools to consider first the desires of the indi-
vidual student rather than the needs of the service. It is, of course, conceivable that
there is no inconsistency between these two considerations and that a plan which aims
primarily to do the "best for the individual" will also be of the largest value to the
service. In order to determine whether this position is justified, it is necessary to ex-
amine some of the individual curricula that are actually constructed by students from
the materials provided by such programs.9 Ten illustrative programs are reproduced
1 Including: options and systems of majors and minors.
3 Five hours elective in group of subjects requiring no preparation outside of class ; five hours in education.
* Choice of six semester hours of science.
4 Electives must include stated courses in music, physical education, drawing-, penmanship, and manual arts.
6 Not more than five hours in technical subjects ; two and one-half hours in agriculture if it has not been taken in
high school.
* Not more than ten hours in technical subjects.
7 Two and one-half hours listed as freely elective for upper grade and rural teachers are specified for primary and
lower grade teachers.
* No 90-hour curriculum is listed in the catalogue.
* The actual curricula of individual students collected in the course of the present study represent a period prior
to the adoption of the plan that has been outlined above, but the plan in operation in some of the normal schools
for ten years prior to 1915 was substantially identical with the present plan in so far as the relative proportions of
168 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
in the Appendix.1 They are fairly typical of the way in which the elective system has
actually worked in practice in three of the normal schools.
EXISTING "CURJUGULA"" NOT PROFESSIONAL
The lack of coherence and interrelationship of courses in these illustrative programs
is not their chief defect. Only in an incidental or casual sense could they be called
professional programs. In almost every case the selection of courses has been deter-
mined apparently without the slightest regard to what the clearly predictable needs
of the teaching situation will be. Under this policy, it is impossible to speak of a
"professional curriculum/' for what results is merely a miscellany of general studies,
put together in a haphazard fashion, with a few courses in educational theory and
practice introduced where they will most conveniently "fit in."
This detachment of the so-called "professional" work, indeed, constitutes a striking
weakness in efforts to provide professional preparation for teachers, not only in the
Missouri normal schools, but in the colleges and universities and in nearly all nor-
mal schools that are organized on the collegiate model. The notion that an adequate
professional curriculum for teachers can be formed by adding a requirement in " edu-
cation" to a "general college course" is thoroughly fallacious; and when only group
requirements are made, permitting students to choose practically any courses that
they please, provided only that such courses appear under the name " education," it is
a travesty to speak of "professional preparation." The Missouri normal schools, hap-
pily, have not gone so far as this, but the options that some of the schools permitted
in respect to certain educational courses at the time when the study was begun showed
a clear tendency to extend the loose elective principle even to the strictly profes-
sional work.2 This tendency has, in part, been corrected since 1915.
prescribed and elective courses are concerned; hence individual curricula made up during these years may legiti-
mately serve to illustrate the tendencies of the general policy. It should be added, however, that all of the schools
have shown a tendency since 1915 to reduce the free electives in some measure, to increase the restricted electives,
and, less noticeably, to increase the prescribed studies. Springfield, indeed, has moved significantly toward a system
of differentiated curricula, each made up largely of prescribed courses.
1 See page 411.
2 Two examples from the catalogues for 1916 may serve to illustrate this tendency:
At Kirksville only ten hours of "strictly professional" work were actually prescribed for the sixty-hour diploma :
these hours were distributed as follows : two and one-half in psychology, two and one-half in history of education,
and five in practice teaching. In addition, five semester hours were to be chosen from four two and one-half hour
courses: principles of teaching, school economy (school management), rural sociology, and the school curriculum.
The principle justifying the options is not obvious. The courses in principles of teaching and school economy are
really complementary courses, the one dealing with the technique of instruction, the other with the details of ad-
ministration in so far as these are matters of concern for the classroom teacher. The normal school student needs
both of these courses. Again, rural sociology should certainly be a requirement in all curricula looking toward rural
school teaching, but it is in no sense equivalent either to the course in the technique of teaching or to the course
in management. The work offered in the course entitled "The school curriculum," as outlined in the catalogue, is
far too extensive to permit of adequate treatment in the time allotted to it, and even if the course were abbrevi-
ated in content or expanded in time, it could scarcely serve as a substitute for the courses in technique.
At Cape Girardeau, the actual prescriptions in professional subjects for the sixty-hour diploma involved approxi-
mately fifteen semester hours of work, including four hours of psychology, two hours of principles of teaching, six
hours of practice teaching, and two hours of experimental pedagogy. But choices were to be made among additional
professional courses until a total of approximately twenty-five hours had been completed. These choices were be-
tween educational psychology and experimental child study, or between the history of education and experimen-
tal child study. Again the justification of these particular options is not clear. There are no two groups of teachers,
one of which needs a knowledge of experimental child study to the exclusion of educational psychology, and the
CURRICULA AS WHOLES 169
d. CURRICULA OF THE CITY TRAINING SCHOOLS
In striking contrast with the curriculum policy of the state normal schools of
Missouri is that of the city training schools. The latter, it should be remembered, are
institutions of collegiate grade only; that is, their enrolment is limited to high school
graduates. Each offers two-year curricula that are comparable in point of entrance
and residence requirements to the sixty-hour curricula of the state normal schools.
But the resemblance ends here. The training-school curricula are prescribed from
the outset, and they emphasize the intensive study of the subjects that the students
will later be called upon to teach. The sharp differences between these truly profes-
sional curricula and the programs of the normal schools may be seen by contrasting
the individual programs above referred to with the following summary of one of the
curricula required in the Harris Teachers College; another curriculum from St. Louis
and one from the Kansas City Training School will be found in the Appendix.1
THE HARRIS TEACHERS COLLEGE CURRICULUM FOR ELEMENTARY TEACHERS.S
First semester: Arithmetic (5);3 Science (2); Geography (4); Hygiene (1); Drawing
(4); Primary method (£); Gymnasium (2); Music (£); Penmanship (£); English (2).
Prepared work, 16; unprepared work, 10. Total, £6.
Second semester: Psychology (5); Science (3); United States history and civics (4);
English (3); Drawing (£); Reading (1); Gymnasium (&); Primary (£); Penmanship
(1); Music (1); Grammar-grade observation (2). Prepared work, 18; unprepared work,
8. Total, 26.
Third semester: Apprentice work (full time).
Fourth semester: Theory of education and school management (5) ; Child psychol-
ogy (3); English (4); History of education (1); Educational sociology (3); Drawing
(£); Music (£); Penmanship (1); Gymnasium (1); Geography (J); History and civics
(|); Arithmetic (|); Drawing (J); Music (J); Gymnasium (J). Total, 24 J.
CONTRAST BETWEEN STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS AND CITY TRAINING SCHOOLS
Why do these two types of institution — the state normal schools and the city train-
ing schools — reveal such striking contrasts? In both cases the typical entering stu-
dent is a high school graduate, looking forward to two years of professional prepara-
tion for the work of teaching, and in so far as these two-year students are concerned,
both types of schools are supposed to be fitting their students for the same kind of
work — service in graded elementary schools. Yet we find the means of effecting this
preparation radically different. In so far as the efficiency of the preparation is con-
other, educational psychology to the exclusion of experimental child study ; nor are there two groups the needs of
which as between the history of education and experimental child study are strikingly differentiated.
1 See pages 417, 418.
2 Report of the St. Louis Board of Education for 1908-09, pages 53, 64. Relatively slight changes appear in a mimeo-
graphed syllabus used in the college at the time the present study was made. These are included in the above
summary.
8 Figures indicate semester hours.
170 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
cerned, there can be no reasonable doubt that the citj training schools, by concentrat-
ing upon a single objective, turn out a better product. They are enabled thus to con-
centrate their energies because elementary school teaching in the large cities offers
rewards which, inadequate tho they may be from many points of view, are still suffi-
ciently attractive to impel high school graduates to look upon the service as a rela-
tively permanent occupation. Outside of the larger cities, however, this is not so fre-
quently the case. High school teaching is much more attractive and significantly better
paid ; furthermore, it is far easier of access than in the large cities. Men particularly
will not be contented with elementary service, and when they undertake normal school
work they are not often thinking of teaching in the elementary school or, permanently,
even in a high school. As has been suggested, the normal schools have recognized this
situation, and have adapted their courses of study and their requirements for gradua-
tion to meet the wishes of the individual rather than the needs of the schools.
NORMAL SCHOOLS HAVE BELITTLED ELEMENTARY INSTRUCTION
This is entirely apart from the question as to whether the normal schools should
aim to prepare teachers for the high schools. Under the present organization of their
curricula, they are deliberately encouraging the student to make elementary teach-
ing, whether in rural schools or in graded schools, a stepping-stone to high, school
teaching, to the teaching and supervision of special subjects, arid to school adminis-
tration ; and this rather than any ambition that they may or may not cherish to be
recognized as competent to prepare high school teachers, or to become "colleges,"
constitutes the most serious charge against them. It is not only possible but quite be-
yond question that certain normal schools may profitably undertake the preparation
of certain types of high school teachers, and a normal school which offers courses of
collegiate grade administered consistently with recognized standards should certainly
rank with other collegiate institutions. But this does not warrant the normal school
in discrediting elementary service in the emphasis of its courses, while it glorifies that
service with unction in public discussion. Nor does it justify it in surrendering its pre-
rogatives as a professional school. The strength of any professional school lies in the
fact that it can aim at a definite objective. The weakness of professional adjuncts to
institutions of general or liberal education lies in the fact that the great bulk of the
work cannot be coordinated and integrated with reference to a definite goal. The
normal schools of Missouri seem quite deliberately to have chosen the weapons of
weakness rather than the weapons of strength. They have adopted the loose program
of studies in preference to the compact, unified organization of real curricula. They
have professionalized their work only by the introduction of detached courses in edu-
cational theory, — comparable in every way to the makeshift requirements in educa-
tion thru which the liberal-arts colleges have sought to justify their claims to recogni-
tion as teacher-training agencies; and no more than these arts colleges have they
attempted to professionalize all of their courses, making each bear with its full force
CURRICULA AS WHOLES 171
upon the central problem of teaching. The normal schools of this type have been fol-
lowers rather than leaders. They have vehemently asserted their "rights/5 but they
have failed to justify their independent existence by adapting themselves throughout
to their peculiar task. They have been imitators, and imitators of something that is
weak rather than of something that is strong.
The city training schools, on the other hand, have escaped these pitfalls, perhaps
in large measure because they have been under no appreciable pressure to build up
large enrolments, and consequently have not been tempted to lose sight of the ser-
vice in efforts to meet individual needs and thereby attract students. The service
itself, too, has been much closer to the city training schools than to the normal schools ;
they are themselves part and parcel of it; and any shortcomings in their methods
or courses are likely to be disclosed quickly and effectively. With less temptation to
scatter their energies, with a constant check upon their work, and under the stimulus
of a direct responsibility for doing one thing well, they have been impelled to focus
their efforts upon a central problem. Where they have been well supported and well
staffed, as in St. Louis, their superiority to the collegiate type of state normal school
cannot be successfully disputed.
THE CITY TRAINING SCHOOLS MISS THEIR FULL OPPORTUNITY
This is far from saying, however, that the training schools are without their weak-
nesses, or that their curricula, while unquestionably better adapted to their purpose
than are the inchoate programs of the normal schools, are as satisfactory as might rea-
sonably be expected. If the normal schools have chafed under the low public estimate
accorded to elementary teaching, and have expressed their irritation by effectually
pointing their students away from the lower schools, the city training schools have
perhaps been too ready to accept the subordinate position of the service for which
they prepare. They have adopted a professional attitude in the construction of their
curricula, but they have not fully professionalized their policies. Not only in St. Louis
and Kansas City, but in most of the city training schools of the country, a single,
undifferentiated two-year curriculum is deemed sufficient to equip the student with
the great variety of skills and insights involved in efficient teaching during all of the
first eight school years. This single curriculum, it is true, usually reflects the actual
materials of the elementary program, and this is most commendable; but the time is
so short and the field is so wide that these materials cannot be covered in a thorough-
going way, and with the ramifications and extensions that are essential if the courses
are to meet the standards suggested in the earlier sections of the present report.
There are many, especially among the workers in the state schools, who oppose the
type of curriculum required in St. Louis on the theory that the work of the teacher
will ultimately be much more efficient if the training curriculum includes some courses
of a more advanced and more distinctly " academic" or "general" character. This
criticism is justified if the courses required in the training school are merely or mainly
172 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
"review" courses; but the criticism loses its point when such courses, while dealing
with elementary subjects, treat those subjects broadly and deeply. This cannot be
done successfully in a two-year curriculum that covers the entire field of elementary
teaching. The attempt to do so is as successful in St. Louis as the circumstances
permit, but a longer curriculum or differentiated curricula, or both, are necessary
to attain the best results.
If, then, the normal schools of the collegiate type have tended to make elementary
teaching a stage preparatory to high school teaching, and have consequently accen-
tuated the unfortunate distinctions of the teaching service, it can be said with equal
truth that the training schools with their narrower field, with every chance to pro-
fessionalize and dignify all grades and levels of elementary instruction, have fallen
short of their opportunities. After all, whatever may be the excuses for the failure
of the normal schools to raise appropriately the character and status of elementary
teaching, the excuses for the failure of the training school to do this are less con-
vincing. There are few large cities to-day that could not successfully demand a three-
year training-school curriculum from the graduates of their local high schools who
wish to become elementary teachers. The training school knows full well the diffi-
culty of preparing teachers in a shorter time, and it should take the initiative and
exercise the leadership in bringing about this extension of the training period. For
the same reason the city training school should be the first to adopt a policy of dif-
ferentiated curricula that will ensure a fair mastery of a restricted field as a basis
for an expanding training in elementary instruction. Neither the normal schools nor
the city training schools can come into their own until they stand firm, not upon
their right to rank with colleges (a right which they should take for granted), but
rather upon the right of the elementary teaching service to rank with other types of
teaching service, and, what is much more fundamental, upon the right of every child
at every level of his instruction to have a teacher especially trained to meet the pe-
culiar problems of that particular period.
%. Organization and Content of Specific Courses
The preceding section dealt with the organization of curricula as wholes. We have
now to consider the specific courses that make up these large units. The emphasis
will be primarily upon the so-called "professional" courses, inasmuch as it is thru
these at the present time that the professional purpose of the teacher- training in-
stitutions is chiefly expressed. The principal courses will be analyzed with the aim of
determining what function each is intended to discharge under the theories now
apparently governing curriculum organization in the Missouri schools. An attempt
will then be made to evaluate this purpose or function in the light of the principles
or standards laid down in the preceding discussions.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : SECONDARY 173
a. PROFESSIONAL COURSES OF SECONDARY GRADE
The professional courses recommended by the conference of 19161 for the rural
certificate curriculum are the following:
(1) Subject-matter of the common school branches with emphasis upon method,
one unit (or one-fourth of a full year's work).
(£) Psychology of learning or elementary psychology, one- third of a unit (or
one-twelfth of a full year's work).
(3) Rural life problems, one-third of a unit.
(4) Rural school management, one-third of a unit.
(5) Methods and observation, one unit.
According to the conference agreement, no one of these courses is to be elected until
at least eight units (two years) of secondary work have been completed. The proposals,
therefore, contemplate three units, or three-fourths of a year, of professional study
distributed over the last two years of the secondary curriculum. The advantages of
concentrating this work in the fourth year and later of amplifying it and transferring
it to a fifth graduate year have been pointed out in the preceding section.2 We are
concerned here only with the purpose and content of these professional courses, and
with their pertinence to the preparation of teachers for the rural schools.
(1) SUBJECT-MATTER OF THE COMMON SCHOOL BRANCHES WITH EMPHASIS UPON METHOD
The conference did well to place this course first in the list, thereby implying that
it will be the first professional work that the pupil undertakes. The time allowed for
it — five periods a week for a year — is too brief, but it is as long as a professional
curriculum on the secondary level can well afford. Then, too, certain phases of ele-
mentary subject-matter are represented in the general high school courses, especially
the courses in English and in American history and civics, which are recommended
as a basis for the professional work. "Methods and observation"" covers the same
ground also from a somewhat different point of view.
In the high school training-classes, the course in elementary subject-matter is
taught by the training teacher, and consequently is treated as a unit course, with
a tendency, no doubt, to distribute the time and emphasis over the various topics
as the needs of the class may demand. In the normal schools the work is covered in
separate courses, each extending over a period of twelve weeks, and each limited to a
single subject, as arithmetic, grammar, or geography. While the training-class stu-
dent will have instruction in all of the important subjects of the elementary program,
the normal school student will have instruction in only three subjects at most.
CONCENTRATION AND UNIFORM TREATMENT NEEDED
The normal schools vary considerably in their offerings and requirements. In gen-
eral, the chief emphasis is upon the relatively advanced phases of the subject-mat-
1 The conference of heads of Missouri training: institutions described on pages 62 and 164,
2 See page 166.
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
ter — those phases that are most clearly represented in the seventh grade and eighth
grade programs. Where the work in elementary subject-matter is parceled out among
the various academic departments, this emphasis upon upper grade topics is probably
inevitable. It is well to ask whether in the normal schools as in the high school train-
ing classes, the year's work in elementary subject-matter and methods might not well
be assigned to one teacher — a person who is familiar not only with the subject-matter
but with the means of adapting it especially to the primary and intermediate grade
pupils who, in the large majority of cases, will form the chief problems of the rural
school teacher. This policy of making the work a unit in charge of a single teacher
constitutes one of the marked advantages of the teacher-training classes and one of
the important elements of their strength. It might even be advisable so to organize
the course that twelve weeks will be given to primary materials and methods, twelve
weeks to intermediate grade materials and methods, and twelve weeks to upper grade
materials and methods; or if not this equal division, at least an organization of mate-
rials that explicitly recognizes these three divisions of school life.
(&) THE PSYCHOLOGY OF LEARNING
According to the recommendations of the conference, a full unit is devoted to what
might be called simple educational theory. The first twelve weeks of this work are
given to an elementary course in educational psychology. Essentially the same course
was given in some of the normal schools prior to the conference agreement. The out-
lines submitted by the instructors indicate that the time is distributed among the
various topics substantially as follows : two weeks are spent in the study of conscious-
ness and its relation to instinctive and acquired modes of behavior; a half-week to
the structure of the nervous system; four or five weeks to habits, sensations and per-
ceptions, imagination, memory, and association ; one or two weeks to attention and
the emotions; and about two weeks to economy in learning and a brief discussion of
the higher thought-processes. The educational applications of each of these topics are
naturally given a strong emphasis.
It is obvious that a course of this sort for high school pupils, limited to twelve weeks,
can at best touch the problems of mental growth but superficially. There is, however,
a distinct need for a brief course introducing the student to the concrete problems of
teaching and giving him some familiarity with the simpler principles of educational
psychology. It is doubtful whether the course should be known as "psychology," for
the tendency under such a designation is toward a detached and formal treatment.
The term "Introduction to Teaching " suggests more clearly both the purpose of the
course and its close correlation with actual schoolroom practice.
(3) RURAL LIFE PROBLEMS
Prior to the conference agreement, most of the normal schools offered two types of
courses dealing with specific rural school problems : (a) rural school methods courses
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : SECONDARY 175
that usually attempted to cover in twelve weeks not only rural school management
but also the methods of teaching all of the elementary school subjects, — an obviously
impossible procedure;1 and (b) courses in "rural life," that were concerned largely
with the broader sociological problems of rural school teaching. With the adoption of
the unit of " subject-matter and methods " and the unit of "observation and methods/'
the superficial twelve- weeks courses were abandoned, and the older "rural life" courses
became the course in "rural life problems," This was an improvement.
The courses in rural life problems as now offered in the normal schools still vary in
scope and content,2 but in general, their development during the past three or four
years is a hopeful sign that the pressing problems of rural education are to receive
adequate attention in the normal schools. When the preparation of the rural school
teacher and the rewards for rural school teaching are placed upon the same basis as
the preparation and rewards for teaching in town and city schools, there will be no
dearth of materials for constructing a rich and fruitful curriculum of studies dealing
primarily with the fundamental problems of rural life and education.
(4) RURAL SCHOOL MANAGEMENT
Another forward step which followed the conference agreement was the develop-
ment of specialized courses in rural school management. Earlier courses in this field
were not clearly differentiated in most cases from the courses in rural life problems,3
and prospective rural school teachers in many instances gained their knowledge of the
precepts and principles of management in the collegiate classes which dealt primarily
with graded school problems. At the present time (1917), each of the schools offers a
separate course in the management of rural schools. It deals with the problems that
have come to be associated with collegiate courses in school management, — classifi-
cation of pupils, construction of the daily program, initiation and maintenance of
1 One of the courses found in the spring of 1915, for example, gave three weeks to reading1, two weeks to language and
grammar, and one week to each of the following subjects: spelling, arithmetic, geography, history and civics, and
agriculture. Another distributed the time of nine weeks among the following topics: child study, observation,
applying standards of criticism, teaching of English in rural schools, teaching of history and geography in rural
schools, and teaching of arithmetic in rural schools, — each of these topics occupying from one week to two and one-
half weeks. The class taking the latter course represented every stage of educational advancement from the first
high school year to the fourth college year. The enrolment as reported by the instructor included not only prospec-
tive rural school teachers, but prospective teachers of high school English and high school history. A third course
was reported by the instructor as including a treatment of "all school subjects: English including reading, spell-
ing, penmanship, arithmetic, elementary science, history, geography, drawing and construction, music." This course
covered twelve weeks 1
2 At Warrensburg, the work is apparently divided between, two twelve-weeks courses ; one (Rural School Methods)
deals with the teaching of the elementary school subjects in such a way that the primary and intermediate grade
problems receive the chief emphasis ; the other is a more general course dealing with personal and public hygiene,
play and recreation, vocational education, boys* and girls* club work, and the organization of the community for
social and economic purposes. At Kirksville, the requirements recommended by the conference are met by a twelve-
weeks course which treats of the changes that have been arid are now taking place in rural life, the effect of these
changes upon the rural school, and the redirection and reorganization of rural education. The course at Springfield
closely resembles that offered at Kirksville. At Cape Girardeau, the course is somewhat more specifically concerned
with the operation of a rural school, emphasizing such problems as the school plant, consolidation, the school as a
community centre, and the teacher as a community leader.
8 A course offered in 1916, for example, dealt with such topics as the tenant system in Missouri, the district as an
administrative unit, the condition of the country church in Missouri, and school laws regarding county and state
funds.
176 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
routine, marking and grading, school attendance, and discipline, — but the treatment
is guided by the fact that the student is preparing for work in one-room schools.
The modification is fundamental, for a one-room school presents problems quite differ-
ent from those of the graded school. Not only is the preparation of the rural school
teacher made more effective by this procedure, but the collegiate courses, relieved of
the presence of secondary pupils, can also be more closely concentrated upon the
graded school problem.
(5) METHODS AND OBSERVATION
A marked disadvantage of the rural certificate curriculum lies in the fact that it
makes no provision for practice teaching. The nearest approach to actual contact
with the teaching situation is represented by the course in observation. The descrip-
tions of this course that appear in the several catalogues arouse suspicion that the
work is largely theoretical and consequently subject to the tendency of such courses
to become either detached and abstract or purely perfunctory. Only one of the schools
(Kirksville) has a model rural school that can be used for observation. As the training-
school facilities in all of the normal schools are so meagre that all or most of the teach-
ing is in the hands of practice teachers, one may infer that whatever observation is
required in the secondary courses is likely to be the observation of practice teachers.
As long as a rural certificate curriculum is offered upon the secondary level, every
possible step should be taken to make it as effective as possible. This cannot be done
without providing in some way for practice teaching, and the requirement of a full
unit for "observation and methods" should certainly include participation and prac-
tice teaching as well as observation. To give time for these activities, some of the
materials dealing systematically with "methods" could be included in the "subject-
matter and methods" course discussed above. In any case, an appreciable amount of
participation and practice teaching should be provided.
SUCCESSFUL PROCEDURE IN MINNESOTA
The plan that has been developed in the high school training-classes of Minnesota
suggests a standard that other secondary systems of teacher-training, whether in high
schools or normal schools, might well seek to attain. According to this plan, one period
each day, practically for the entire year, is spent by the training-class student in
the elementary school. At the beginning of the year two weeks are given to close
observation. Then each student takes a group of about five pupils for fifteen minutes
each day, the teaching being limited at the outset to very simple exercises, prefer-
ably of the " drill " type. After two weeks of this work, the training-class spends a
week in visiting and observing neighboring rural schools, and the following week is
devoted to a discussion of these visits. With this preparation the more intensive
teaching of small groups in the local graded schools is begun and continued for three
months. Following this, two months are spent in teaching larger groups, and then
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : COLLEGIATE 177
two weeks in actual rural school teaching. For the specific purpose of providing the
students with experience in beginning first grade work, small classes are organized
toward the end of the year comprising children in the community who would nor-
mally enter school the subsequent fall. Students take charge of the classes under close
supervision and work with them for eight weeks.
A plan of this sort demands, of course, an abundance of "laboratory"" material, and
would be quite impracticable in normal schools so limited in this respect as are those
of Missouri. The high school training-classes, with their relatively small enrolments
and their abundance of local practice materials, are much more favorably situated in
this respect. A normal school suitably located with a number of the schools of a town
or city under its control could readily make similar arrangements. In any case, the
normal school, wherever located, if it undertakes the preparation of rural school
teachers, should make satisfactory provisions for a period of both observation and
practice in neighboring rural schools.
6. PROFESSIONAL CoUESES OF COLLEGIATE GllADE1
The distinction between secondary and collegiate courses in the professional study
of education has been less a difference in the names and materials used than the often
more important difference in the intellectual experience and preparedness of the stu-
dent. The same is true of other subjects, such as literature, history, economics, and
sociology; the materials to be presented bear the same name whether offered upon the
secondary or the collegiate level. This is perhaps one reason why the Missouri normal
schools have failed, until recently, to limit registration in professional courses of colle-
giate grade to students of collegiate standing, and have thus produced courses of neu-
tral hue that were neither collegiate nor secondary. In the spring of 1915, twenty-
three out of fifty-one collegiate classes in strictly professional subjects reported a
mixed enrolment representing both college students and high school pupils. The prac-
tice was defended on the ground that the secondary pupils admitted to these courses
were almost always mature men and women who had had some experience in teach-
ing. As a matter of fact, however, twenty-eight per cent of the secondary pupils en-
rolled in these classes were below the age of twenty, the proportion of immature stu-
dents in the mixed classes being six per cent higher than in the classes that were
limited to bonajide college students. Wide variations in maturity tend to accompany
wide variations in training, and there can be no doubt that both the organization of
material and the work of a class, the members of which vary widely as to training and
maturity, will suffer in comparison with that of a homogeneous group.2 It is gratify-
ing to note that the Missouri normal schools have since adopted a consistent policy of
1 Conspectus of the professional courses offered in the fire schools during the year 1916-17 will be found in the Ap-
pendix, pages 40&411.
2 The range of ages was wide in both groups of classes, but considerably wider in the mixed classes than in the
classes limited to college students ; the average age-range of the former group was nearly nineteen years as con-
trasted with fifteen years, the average age-range of the latter group.
178 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
differentiating collegiate work from secondary work at every point. With this policy
established, it will be much easier to enforce prerequisites and to raise the standards
of professional courses.
INTER-SCHOOL VARIATIONS
The variations in the amount and character of the professional work actually re-
quired in the several schools are interesting in the light that they throw upon the
general theory under which the curricula are organized and administered. Of strictly
professional courses of collegiate grade, five may be recognized as constituting a fairly
well standardized equipment for the prospective teacher: (1) psychology; ($) the his-
tory of education; (3) general method or principles of teaching; (4) school manage-
ment, sometimes designated as "school economy11 or as "school administration;" and
(5) observation, participation, and practice teaching. Not all of these subjects are re-
quired by each of the normal schools, but two or more of them are among the require-
ments of every collegiate curriculum.1 Psychology, general method or principles of
teaching, and practice teaching are required by all of the schools for the sixty-hour,
or two-year, curriculum. At Kirksville, Warrensburg, and Springfield, two and one-
half semester hours of psychology are demanded; at Mary ville, this amount is doubled;
while at Cape Girardeau, four semester hours are deemed sufficient, altho two sem-
ester hours of child study have recently been added to the prescribed studies. In
practice teaching the requirement of five semester hours or the equivalent is uniform
among the five schools. A course in the history of education and a course in school
management are required in four of the schools. These are commonly offered for two
and one-half semester hours.
(1) PSYCHOLOGY
INTRODUCTORY COURSE
The introductory course in psychology in the Missouri normal schools is "general"
in its character; that is, it attempts to give the student a systematic account of the
science as it has been developed by the pure psychologist. In this respect it differs
from the secondary course referred to in the preceding section.2 The latter, it will be
remembered, is usually designated as "educational psychology," and lays its strongest
emphases upon the topics that are most closely related to the art of teaching. The
general and systematic character of the collegiate course is shown both in the text-
books that are employed and in the outlines of courses furnished by the instructors
in charge of classes.3
1 With the exception of the general college curriculum at Cape Girardeau, which may be completed without any
professional courses whatsoever.
* See page 174.
9 It was also fully substantiated by what was seen in the classes visited during the spring of 1916. In one of these
classes, the first part of the hour was spent in discussing the anatomy of the retina, and the remaining time was
given to the phenomena of color-mixing, both topics that could profitably be dismissed with a brief reference and
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PSYCHOLOGY 179
The course is apparently conceived by most of the normal school teachers of the
subject as furnishing the student with an introduction to psychological study for its
own sake, rather than as a "practical" course dealing with facts and principles directly
applicable to the problems of teaching, or as an "orienting" course furnishing an ini-
tial view of the problems of teaching and learning. The course follows the college
model with fair fidelity.
ADVANCED COURSES IN PSYCHOLOGY
In making the introductory course in psychology "general" in its scope'and char-
acter, the normal schools have not been unmindful of the applied phases of the sub-
ject. In most of the schools advanced courses are offered, and these almost always
deal with pedagogical applications. In the state schools, however, with two excep-
tions, this advanced work is either elective or alternative in so far as the two-year cur-
ricula are concerned; and consequently it is not generally undertaken by a considerable
proportion of the students.1 The two exceptions are Springfield and Cape Girardeau,
both of which require a course in child study in the two-year curricula.
As with many of the other "professional" subjects, the value of psychology in the
preparation of teachers has been seriously questioned. This skepticism has been due
in part, at least, to the formal and general character of the courses that are usually
required. The systematic study of psychology as a "pure" science undoubtedly has
a place in some certain normal school curricula. Its function, however, is not prima-
rily that of a propaedeutic to the detailed study of the teaching process. It certainly
does not constitute a body of theory that may be passed on to the beginning stu-
dent in the hope that he will be able to deduce from its principles and postulates
the rules and precepts of successful practice.
TEACHING LESS AN APPLIED SCIENCE THAN A FINE ART
The traditional organization of teacher- training curricula seems to rest upon the
assumption that teaching is, or at least may ultimately become, an applied science,
analogous in every essential respect to medicine, engineering, and agriculture; and,
consequently, that adequate preparation for teaching is first to lay down the general
principles and then to apply them to the concrete teaching situation. This assumption
would make the study of psychology in the normal school analogous to the study
might even be entirely dispensed with in an introductory normal school course. Another class spent the hour In
discussing the definitions of psychology proposed by Ladd and Stout; the assignment for the following day in-
volved the problem — "How does psychological analysis differ from physical analysis ?" The instructor was skilful
in directing the discussion of the rather immature students thru these highly theoretical topics, but it seemed
hardly a profitable use of one out of only sixty recitation periods given to* the entire course, A third class was deal-
ing in an abstract way with the practical problem of training memory. The attention was well sustained, however,
and the hour's work no doubt yielded a profit. The discussion gradually led to the statement of two problems
which formed the assignment for the following day : * * What constitutes a *natural relationship ' ? " and * ' Are logical
relationships natural relationships?"
1 For example, in the spring of 1916, in Kirksville, there were 2T students in one of the two sections in general psy-
chology as against 12 students in the only other psychological course offered to students of collegiate grade.
180 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
of physiology in the medical school, the study of theoretical mechanics in the en-
gineering school, and the study of chemistry in the agricultural school.
There is, of course, something of this applied science character in teaching, but
fundamentally teaching is much more closely allied to the fine arts than to the ap-
plied sciences. Just as many gifted painters have been ignorant of the science of
optics; just as many good musicians have an adequate knowledge neither of the
physics of music nor of the psychology of tone; just as many effective writers and
speakers would be unable to formulate the principles of style ; so good teachers have
taught well in the past, and will doubtless teach well in the future, altho quite un-
conscious of the principles that lie back of their art. The painter, the musician, the
writer, and the teacher might very likely do their work much better if they possessed
this knowledge of theory ; but something other than an understanding of theory is
assuredly the basic element in successful practice.
Somewhere between the fine arts and the applied sciences, then, but closer to the
former than to the latter, stands the art of teaching. In so far as psychological prin-
ciples can explain and rationalize successful practice, the study of psychology by the
prospective teacher will have a positive value, but no amount of psychology can take
the place of the study of the actual concrete process of teaching as it is carried on
by a master, coupled with the patient self-discipline that comes from true apprentice-
ship. The value of psychology from this point of view is not to furnish general prin-
ciples from which specifics for practice may be derived, but rather to furnish an in-
terpretative basis for a study of practice. It is not a propaedeutic to teaching in the
sense that physics is a propaedeutic to engineering; it is rather an accompaniment,
bearing to the curriculum for the prospective teacher a relation analogous to that
which the study of color theories bears to the curriculum of the artist, or the study
of counterpoint and harmony to the curriculum of the musician. In so far as the arts
of painting and music are concerned, the classroom where theory is taught is an ad-
junct to the studio where the chief work of training is concentrated; in so far as the
art of teaching is concerned, the classroom in psychology is but an adjunct to the labo-
ratory school where participation in the actual task of teaching may give to the novice
something akin to the deft touch of the experienced teacher*
PSYCHOLOGY NECESSARY TO A SOUND VIEW OF EDUCATION
It is unfortunate that educational theory, of which psychology is a part, has suf-
fered quite undeserved condemnation merely because of its inadequacy for prescribing
technique. There has been a very general failure to recognize that the study of theory
exercises an important function that is quite independent of its influence upon the art
of teaching. While the young teacher will depend largely upon imitation and practice
to master the technique of his art, and while the normal school in consequence must
first of all provide abundant opportunities for the successful mastery of technique
in this empirical fashion, it should not be forgotten that the teacher should be some-
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PSYCHOLOGY 181
thing more than a craftsman. If the ideals of democracy are to be reflected in the edu-
cational system, the teachers themselves must be charged with some measure of re-
sponsibility for constructing, evaluating, and criticising general educational proposals
and programs; they must know the relation of education to other social forces;
they must know what functions education has to discharge, what institutions and
agencies are available, and under what limitations these institutions and agencies do
their work. The process of teaching is, of course, the primary concern of every teacher,
but education comprehends far more than this, and the teacher is a minister of edu-
cation.
The capacity thus to share with one^s colleagues the responsibility of determining
educational policies may bear no discoverable relation to one's actual skill as a teacher.
It is, indeed, quite possible that a training limited to the skill aspects of teaching may
produce a type of classroom efficiency marvelously well adapted to an educational sys-
tem that is organized on the factory plan, — a system in which the thinking, the plan-
ning, and the responsible direction are centralized in a single official, or in a group of
officials, standing over the classroom teachers much as the boss in a factory stands over
the workers. This situation is not unlike that in which American education is involved
to-day — and such a situation should not continue. The teachers themselves should
have a very large part in determining the educational policies of the country, and with
the mature, well-trained, and relatively permanent teaching staff which we hope will
shortly replace the present immature, untrained, and short-lived body of teachers, we
may look forward hopefully to the realization of the democratic ideal. Not all can be
leaders, but in an effective democracy all must be intelligent interpreters and critics.
TWOFOLD REQUIREMENT FUOM PSYCHOLOGY
We conclude, then, that the study of psychology in the teacher's curriculum has to
fulfil two fairly distinct functions: (1) it must provide a basis for explaining and
interpreting successful teaching practices as well as principles from which to derive
new and better practices; and (£) it must furnish a wdrking theory of the mental life
as a basis for understanding the larger problems of education, many of which are only
remotely connected with teaching.1 For the latter purpose psychology is only one of
1 The failure to recognize this twofold function of the study of psychology is doubtless responsible in large part for
the conflicting: views regarding the actual value of this subject in the professional preparation of teachers.
On the one hand, there is the type of evidence that is represented by the report of the Wisconsin normal school
survey (1914), summarizing data gathered from replies by training-school principals and critic teachers to the ques-
tion, "Whether psychology and pedagogy as taught in the normal department helped students in their teaching in
the training school.** Unfortunately for our purposes, psychology and pedagogy were not separated in this ques-
tion; consequently the proportion of the criticisms to be charged against psychology is difficult to determine. From
individual replies published in the report, however, it would seem that the courses in pedagogy are somewhat
less severely criticised than the courses in psychology. Of the sixty persons replying to the question —
18.3% state that psychology and pedagogy help the students in their practice teaching;
66.6% state that these subjects do not help or that the help is slight;
15.1% state that they are unable to judge.
The detailed criticisms that are reproduced in the report emphasize particularly—
(a) The academic nature of psychology and pedagogy as these subjects are commonly taught in the normal
schools;
(6) The immaturity of the students at the time when these courses are taken ;
182 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
several subjects of study, each of which should contribute its quota of principles, hypo-
theses, and points of view to a general theory of education. A substantial groundwork
in biology is doubtless as important in this regard as psychology, while the claims of
economics, sociology, and the history of education should not be overlooked.
Altho these two functions of psychology are distinct, they can be fulfilled in part by
the same courses. In one-year and two-year curricula, the first function is the more
important, for while the teacher must be something more than a craftsman, he must
be a craftsman first. Indeed, if he is to work in the schools for only a limited period,
his contributions to constructive educational policies will necessarily be very slight.
The shorter curricula, then, may well afford to emphasize the kind of psychology that
bears most directly upon the art of teaching. Furthermore, the courses in systematic
psychology will mean much more to the student if he has approached them gradually
thru a study of the concrete facts illustrated in the processes of teaching and learning.
These courses may well be reserved, then, for the later stages of the longer curricula,
where they will be taken by students who are presumably looking upon the work of
teaching as a permanent career.
PROPOSED ORGANIZATION OF COURSES IN PSYCHOLOGY
Consistently with this view, the following organization of the work in psychology
is suggested :
I. In all professional curricula on the collegiate level there should be an introduc-
tory course preceded or paralleled by a course in biology, and closely related to the
student's participation in the work of teaching. This course should furnish a bird's-eye
view of the teacher's task, and, like the first professional course proposed for the rural
certificate curriculum,1 might well be termed an "Introduction to Teaching" rather
than an introduction to psychology. Aside from an initial effort to define in simple and
concrete terms the problem of teaching, it would be largely psychological in its charac-
ter, very concrete and "practical" in its content, and concerned with such topics as in-
stincts, habits, the laws of learning, the technique of study, and the significance of in-
dividual differences — topics that have a definite application to classroom teaching.
Something regarding the mental characteristics of children at successive levels of
growth and development should also be included. The purpose of the course should be
not to cover the ground intensively, but rather to do what the name implies — provide
an introduction. It should furnish a point of view and a terminology for later work.2
(c) The wide gulf between theory and practice;
(d) The lack of constant or frequent use in psychology classes of the material for illustration and demonstra-
tion that the training- school affords.
On the other hand, the questionnaire submitted to graduates of the Missouri normal schools regarding the pro-
fessional courses that had proved of largest value to them in their actual work as teacher gave the third place to
psychology in a group of nine subjects. (See page 442.) It should also be noted that J. L. Meriam's study Nor-
mal School Education and Efficiency (New York, 1906), revealed a higher correlation between class standing in
psychology and success in teaching than between success in teaching and class standing in any other normal school
course except practice teaching.
1 See page 174.
a There is abundant evidence that the traditional coarse in general psychology is not needed as a basis for a course
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PSYCHOLOGY 183
£. This introductory treatment should be amplified in all of the courses that follow.
In other words, every course in the normal school should be in an important sense
a course in psychology. The abundance of opportunities for realizing this aim will
be referred to in the following sections. It is sufficient here to point out that there is
no better place to teach the important facts regarding individual differences than
in the courses on school management and the technique of teaching ; nowhere may the
characteristics of the child's mind in its successive stages of growth be more clearly
illustrated than in connection with the work in reading and arithmetic; while the
principles of habit formation and the laws of learning may be applied and exem-
plified in every subject and every class.
3. Finally, the student will come to the systematic courses, which should be designed
to bring together in a comprehensive and orderly manner the detailed facts with
which by this time an intimate acquaintance will have been gained. This treatment
should be attempted even in the shorter curricula to the extent of gathering together
the important precepts and principles that relate to the art of teaching. In the longer
curricula, however, it should have the wider aim of leaving with the student a fairly
definite body of educational doctrine to prepare him for the *kind of constructive
thinking referred to above.
The general principle of curriculum organization here proposed will be emphasized
in discussing other subjects as well as psychology. In essence, it involves the integra-
tion of all of the work of the normal school into one consistent whole. A true curric-
ulum is more than a mere aggregation of courses, it is an organization dominated
by a unitary purpose. If this principle is to be worked out effectively, each instructor
must necessarily be familiar with the work of the other instructors. There must be
frequent conferences upon the ever-recurring problem of making each element in
the curriculum — not only each course, but each topic in each course — contribute
its maximum of influence toward the effective working of the whole. The careful,
periodic adjustment of the various parts of the educational organism is just as neces-
sary as the careful, periodic adjustment of a watch or of any other finely organized
structure. It makes for a maximum of efficiency and a minimum of waste. Applied
to the particular departments under discussion, it would not only prevent needless
duplications and repetitions of the same materials in different courses, but it would
ensure them when needed. There would be an end to the student's complaint that
what he has been taught in one course is retaught in another as tho it were being
that deals primarily with the psychological interpretation of the art of 'teaching. A committee of the American
Psychological Association, of which Professor G. M. Whipple was chairman, reported in 1910 that educational psy-
chology did not need this general basis. ("Teaching of Psychology in Normal Schools," Psycholoffical Monograph,
vol. xii, No. 51, 1910.) In the departments of education in several universities introductory courses in educational
psychology are offered without a prerequisite in general psychology, and are completed successfully by students
who have not had courses of the latter type. For example, Teachers College, Columbia University, after some years
of requiring general psychology as a prerequisite, now offers the following course : "Educational Psychology. . . .
This course gives a general treatment of the elements of educational psychology. It is designed to meet the needs
of graduate students who have had little or no previous training in psychology ."(Announcements, 1916-17, page 45.)
Harvard University, the University of Missouri, and the University of Illinois also offer courses in educational psy-
chology without requiring general psychology.
184 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
presented for the first time. There would be an end also of the too well-founded criti-
cism that the courses in theory have no influence upon practice — are not even reflected
in the practical courses offered in the same school.
(2) HISTORY OF EDUCATION
COURSES OFFERED IN MISSOURI SCHOOLS
A course in the history of education is prescribed for the two-year curricula in
both of the city training schools and in all of the state normal schools except Cape
Grirardeau. The amount of work required varies, however, from thirty class periods
at Kansas City to sixty at Kirks ville and Springfield, eighty at Harris Teachers Col-
lege, and one hundred twenty at Warrensburg and Mary ville. The character of the
prescribed work also varies. At Kirksville only the first term is required in the two-
year curricula, altho a second term is demanded for the three-year and four-year
curricula. The first term's work covers the long period from the earliest times to the
eighteenth century; consequently the student who remains for only two years has a
fairly comprehensive course in the history of education during the ancient, mediaeval,
and early modern periods, but nothing of the very important developments of the past
two centuries. Much more reasonable is the practice at Springfield, where the history
of elementary education (a one-term course) is required for the two-year curricula,
while in the longer curricula one additional term covering the general field is pre-
scribed. At the Harris Teachers College the course covers the general field, but the
greatest emphasis is laid upon the modern period.1
FUNCTION OF HISTORY OF EDUCATION IN THE PROFESSIONAL PREPARATION OF TEACHERS
In spite of the wealth of material available for these courses in the history of
education, the value of the study in curricula for the preparation of teachers has
been more frequently and more seriously questioned than has the value of any other
strictly professional course. The Missouri teachers who were asked to rank the pro-
fessional subjects in the order of their influence upon the actual work of teaching
almost invariably placed the history of education very low in the scale, and in the
combined rankings it is not only found at the foot of the list, but the margin that
separates it from the other courses is so wide as to indicate a very general skepticism
as to its worth.2 Similar doubts as to the importance of the study in affecting the
student's later practice are forcibly expressed in a symposium3 on the professional
1 In the general courses, Monroe's Textbook in the History of Education is listed as the basic text except at Kirks-
ville, where the work is apparently based upon the instructor's syllabus. No report on the history of education was
received from the Kansas City Training- School. Extensive collateral readings are required in all of the schools •
the supplementary books most frequently mentioned in the instructors' outlines are: Graves's History of Educa-
tion; Laurie's Pre-Christian Education: Monroe's Source-Book,- the textbooks of Kemp, Compayre, and Davidson;
Quick's Educational Reformers; the "Great Educators" series ; Painter's Pedagogical Essays ; and, as source mate-
rials, the Smile, Spencer's Education, and Pcstalozzi's Leonard and Gertrude. 2 See page 442.
s Yearbook. Society of College Teachers of Education, 1912. Judd and Parker (.Bulletin No. 12> United States Bureau
of Education, 1916) also speak strongly against the requirement of the history of education in the two-year curricula.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : HISTORY OF EDUCATION 185
subjects prepared for one of the meetings of the Society of College Teachers of
Education.
On the other hand, when eighty school superintendents, high school principals,
and college teachers of education were asked to rank eighteen different professional
courses ordinarily offered in university departments of education in the order of their
value in the training of high school teachers, the combined ratings gave the history
of education a respectable place.1 And it is undoubtedly true that the courses in the
history of education have a much better status among members of college faculties
than have any other courses given by the departments of education.
It is probable that these differences of opinion are due in part to the failure to recog-
nize, as in the case of psychology, that the value of a subject in a prospective teach-
er's curriculum is not to be measured entirely by the influence of this subject upon
the technique of teaching. The direct influence of the history of education would,
indeed, be less than that of psychology, but its indirect influence may be far from
negligible and its contributions to what we have termed the"professional intelligence"
of the teacher are of obvious importance. The instructors in this subject, indeed, lay
a large emphasis upon this last-named factor. The function of the study is frankly
" interpretative;" its essential outcomes are to be expressed not in increased skill,
but in such terms as "interpretative backgrounds," "points of view," "appreciative
attitudes," and the like.2
It would indeed be unfortunate if the demand for the immediately "practical"
should blind one to the importance of ensuring the attitudes and points of view that
only historical study can furnish. Nevertheless, in spite of the fact that many of
those opposed to the history of education condemn it simply because it seems to lack
immediate utility, there is a serious question as to whether the present organiza-
tion of the subject in typical normal school courses furnishes the most practicable
means of attaining these desired results. A painstaking examination of the courses
1 See H. A. Holllster: Courses in Education Best Adapted to the Needs of High School Teachers and Sigh School
Principals, in School and Home Education,, xxvi ; 8, 216 (April, 1917). The various courses were found to stand in the
following order: Educational psychology ; technique of teaching-; teaching: of special subjects; principles of second-
ary education; theory of teaching; principles of education (general course); history of education (general); edu-
cational sociology; history of education in the United States ; educational measurements; the psychology of sub-
jects; high school curricula; philosophy of education; genetic psychology; high school administration ; supervision
of instruction ; the curricula of the schools (general); practice teaching; industrial education; educational classics ;
school supervision; educational administration (general) ; foreign school systems. This ranking represents the courses
as they were rated for the training of high school teachers ; the ranking for the training of principals was somewhat
different. It should be noted, of course, that in either case the situation is not quite comparable with that which
is involved in considering the history of education as a part of two-year curricula for elementary teaching.
2 The following statements are quoted from the answers given by instructors in the history of education to the ques-
tion, "What is the specific aim of the course?"
"A more intelligent grasp of educational problems. Wider conceptions of the teacher's work. The present under-
stood through the past."
"To give the student an understanding of our present educational theory and practice through a study of its
development and evolution."
*'To give the student the proper historical setting for all educational theory and practice."
"To interpret and evaluate present educational problems in the light of past school experience.*
"To give a deeper appreciation and better understanding of our present educational situation when viewed trom
an historical standpoint.'1
"To acquaint the elementary teacher with the special significance and importance of elementary education as
revealed in the history of that institution. To make intelligent a great many of the current educational practices.
186 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
given and of the work done in the classes offers convincing evidence that the courses
in the general history of education are not suited to students of the junior college
level; they are distinctly senior college or university courses, presupposing a matur-
ity of mind, a breadth of outlook, and a historical and philosophical background
that it would be hopeless to expect in a student just out of the high school or with
but a year's collegiate work,1 As an advanced study, forming the climax of a three-
year or four-year curriculum, the history of education can be made, and doubtless
frequently is made, to realize its rich possibilities. As an elementary study, under-
taken early in the period of professional training, or as a part of the brief and con-
gested one-year and two-year programs, its justification is certainly debatable. It is
possible that, in a two-year curriculum, a summarizing course which will treat the
principles of education genetically may have a legitimate place. This possibility will
be referred to in the following section.
SUGGESTED REARRANGEMENT OF HISTORY OF EDUCATION
The real need, however, is that the principle to which reference was made in the
discussion of psychology should be applied likewise to the history of education. There
would be a distinct advantage in making each teacher of the specific courses in meth-
ods, school management, and the principles of teaching responsible for the historical
aspects of his subject. The significance of the modern methods of teaching reading,
for example, is much more keenly appreciated by the student if he knows something
of the older methods of teaching reading, and the appropriate point, indeed the only
effective point, at which to give the student this historical perspective upon the read-
ing problem is in the specific course that deals with primary reading. Again, the
courses in arithmetic and in the teaching of arithmetic offer innumerable occasions
for illuminating present practices thru references to the development, both of arith-
metic itself and of the methods of teaching it to children. The modern conceptions
of geography and history as component parts of the elementary program faithfully
reflect the fundamental doctrines of the important modern educational reformers
from Pestalozzi, Froebel, Herbart, and Herbert Spencer to contemporary leaders like
John Dewey; in presenting these conceptions as they recur in the specific courses in
geography and history, there is the best possible opportunity to give the student an
initial acquaintance with the philosophy on which they rest. The study of school
management and the technique of teaching is probably best approached by the same
genetic method ; the apparently trivial details of classroom routine, for example, take
on a new meaning when their development is traced from the old days of individual
instruction, thru the innovations of the Jesuits and the Christian Brethren and the
1 The classes in the history of education in the Missouri normal schools in the spring of 1915 were made up predom-
inantly of second-year students; in no case was a pupil of secondary grade registered, and in only one class out of
eight reporting was the registration predominantly of first-year students. At the Harris Teachers College, the work
in the history of education is given in the last semester of the two-year curriculum*, at the Kansas City Training
School, the course is given in the last ten weeks of the second year.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : GENERAL METHOD 187
contributions of the Bell- Lancaster schools, to the modern system of classroom organ-
ization; the discussion of school discipline forms a most effective setting for significant
references to the historical development of individualism in education, and some
of the important ideas of such reformers as Rousseau, Froebel, and Spencer can here
be introduced as growing out of concrete problems. It is a sound psychology that
associates the earlier stages of an institution or of an educational practice with the
treatment that most completely reveals its modern significance. The "practical"
courses not only afford the natural opportunities for this; they are urgently in need
of the illumination and enforcement that comes from skilfully laid historical per-
spectives. Moreover, most topics gain enormously in weight and dignity when so
treated. The handling of educational concepts as growths demanding development
in accurate and disciplined thinking on the part of the student is an essential charac-
teristic of instruction that may properly be considered to be of collegiate quality.
The treatment proposed is a most effective propaedeutic for the systematic courses.
The principles of curriculum construction that were emphasized in the discussion of
psychology have a most important application here. The systematic work in the
history of educational theories, like the systematic courses in psychology, fulfils its
proper function in preparing the teacher not for technical duties of the classroom
but for constructive thinking regarding general educational problems. The place of
this work in the shorter curricula, therefore, is less important than in the longer cur-
ricula, not only because the students are not so well prepared for it, but because it
will be of large service only to those who remain long enough in the profession to
have a share in determining educational policies.
(3) GENEEAL METHOD AND PRINCIPLES OF TEACHING
The term "general method" has an interesting history . In American normal schools
from 1870 to 1890, instruction in the technique of teaching was based upon such
books as White's Pedagogy and Fitch's Art of Teaching. These are in the main sim-
ple compilations of the rules that long experience in classroom work has established.
They were most serviceable books in their day, and the general type of handbook that
they represent is still useful as a guide to young and inexperienced teachers. Such
books, however, are essentially empirical in their character, for while they sometimes
attempt to justify the practices that they recommend upon the basis of general
principles, the latter are usually little more than palpable truisms. Courses based
upon such materials are far from satisfactory in classes above the secondary level.
The development of "general method" constituted in American pedagogy the first
significant step away firom this rule-of- thumb procedure and toward the development
of a consistent and unified theory of teaching. A "general" method of teaching, ob-
viously, is a method that may be applied to any given teaching task; it is a proced-
ure of universal validity. The Herbartians believed that they had found this in the
188 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
five "formal steps," each with its distinctive purpose and all cooperating toward the
consummation of the teaching process as they conceived it, namely., the development
in the mind of the learner of a general truth. It was this procedure, derived from Her-
bart's analysis of the development of ideas and elaborated by his followers, especially
Ziller and Rein, that constituted the "general method" introduced into American
normal schools and university departments of education during the decade following
1890.1 The movement to extend normal school curricula beyond the secondary level
— already well under way at this time — and the rapid growth of departments of
education in the colleges and universities had led to a demand for something more
clearly consistent with collegiate standards than the older books on pedagogy repre-
sented. The Herbartian theory of teaching promised at first to meet this demand.
Modern developments in psychology, particularly as influenced by the theory of
evolution and by the experimental method, also began at about this time to affect
the professional courses in the normal schools and colleges. The cult of "child study,"
which assumed the evolutionary point of view, tended to shift the emphasis in pro-
fessional training from the subject-matter, where the Herbartian doctrines placed
it, to the child and to the development of his body as well as of his mind. At the
same time the experimentalist in psychology displayed a profound contempt for
the "armchair" speculation that had preceded the day of the psychological labo-
ratory, even discrediting the work of so keen and competent a philosopher as Her-
bart. Meanwhile, the assumption that the procedure crystallized in the five " formal
steps " of Herbart constituted a method applicable to all teaching situations could
not long be sustained even philosophically. While the theory worked admirably in
certain types of school exercises, there were other lessons, known empirically to be
essential to the progress of children, that could not be fitted into these forms. "Gen-
eral method," then, while a notable advance over the kind of pedagogy that had
preceded it, came upon the stage just a little too late to be long influential.
The Herbartian sway lasted in Missouri until about 1905, and still persists in
some of the schools in the name of the course, "general method.''1 But the content
of this course has been greatly modified, and the term "principles of teaching, " a
much more appropriate designation, has largely replaced the older name. In this trans-
formation, the influence of modern psychology was first most strongly felt, and the sci-
entific attitude assumed by psychology caused a return to something like the empiri-
cal treatment characteristic of the older books on pedagogy. The attempt was made,
however, to justify successful practice by reference to accepted psychological prin-
ciples, and in some cases to derive new precepts of practice from more general prin-
ciples. A little later the influence of John Dewey began to be felt in the courses in
principles of teaching, especially in the emphasis placed upon teaching thru "prob-
1 The leaders in the Herbartian movement in America were Charles De Garmo, who published his Essentials of
Method in 1890, and Charles A. McMurry and Frank M. McMurry, the former of whom, issued a General Method in
189S, and both of whom published as joint authors in 1898, The Method of the Recitation, by far the most influential
book that the Herbartian movement produced in America.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : GENERAL METHOD 189
lems" and "projects," and in the importance attached to the "socializing" features
of both subject-matter and methods of teaching. Indeed, the emphasis now being
given to the "problem" method suggests that the present tendency is again toward
an a-priori theory of practice.
PRESENT STATUS OF "GENERAL METHOD"
Whatever may be its name, the course in principles of teaching, as offered in Mis-
souri, is now a combination of general educational theory and the technique of teach-
ing. A study of "lesson types" is almost always a feature of the course, and this is com-
monly accompanied by the preparation of lesson plans. In this sense, especially, the
course becomes an introduction to practice teaching, and is usually listed as a pre-
requisite. Aside from the treatment of lesson types, the courses vary widely in content
according to the particular theory of education subscribed to by the instructor.
In spite of their nebulous character, the courses in general method and the prin-
ciples of teaching seem to meet a real need. The teachers of Missouri who rated the
professional subjects in the order of their importance place these courses second, giv-
ing the first place to courses in "special methods."1 It is impossible to determine from
the replies whether the theoretical or the practical phases of the courses are adjudged
to be of the greater value, but in view of the fact that the special- methods courses
are rated highest, one may infer that the opportunity to study the actual technique of
teaching is the important contribution of the courses in principles of teaching. The
Harris Teachers College does not offer a course in general method, but the principles
that underlie all of the detailed work of the first three semesters are gathered into a
comprehensive summarizing course in the principles of education in the final semester.
MOST ADVANTAGEOUS POSITION OF THE COUESE
The arrangement of the courses at the Harris Teachers College suggests again the
advantage of postponing the systematic discussion of educational theory until well
toward the end of the curriculum. If this is done, the course in principles of teaching
may be made definitely to concern itself with the technique of teaching. This does
not mean that the course should exclude educational theory, or that it should return
to the status of the old-time, rule-of-thumb "pedagogy ;"" it means rather that theory
should emerge from the study of actual practice and not be imposed as a set of fun-
damental principles from which valid precepts of practice can be deductively derived;
it means that the student should from the outset be placed in a position where he will
be stimulated to think out for himself the reasons for the success or failure of this or
that practice. Such thinking will necessarily be crude and unsatisfactory at the begin-
ning, and here lies the opportunity of the instructor to guide the student in the con-
struction of adequate educational standards.
The proposal here, as in connection with the courses in psychology and the history
1 See summary on page 442.
190 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
of education, is simply to apply to the professional preparation of teachers the induc-
tive procedure which educational theory itself has long endorsed, and which has been
applied with most notable success in other types of professional education, particu-
larly in law and in medicine. It is true that legal education in the United States
offers unique opportunities to follow an inductive method, for the common law, as
Professor Redlich so clearly points out,1 "is case-law and nothing else than case-law;"
whatever general principles it involves have come out of actual decisions of the courts
in trying individual cases, and the most effective way for the law student to gain a
comprehension of these principles is to analyze and compare actual cases. It is prob-
able, indeed, that many of these principles defy actual formulation in words; thru
a rigid analysis of concrete cases the student seems gradually to come to the point
where he "feels" without formulating the standard upon which this or that issue may
be decided.
The situation in respect to the actual work of classroom teaching is, in many re-
spects, analogous to this. No one has as yet definitely formulated a body of doctrine
which can be given to a young teacher with the hope that, thru its application, he
will be able to solve all of his problems successfully. The fact that the preliminary
study of educational theory has often either no influence upon later practice or an
unfortunate influence has been pointed out again and again. This is not so much an
indictment of theory as an indication that the theory has come at the wrong time,
has been approached in the wrong way, and has been directed, so to speak, toward
the wrong end.
(4) SCHOOL MANAGEMENT, CLASS MANAGEMENT, AND SCHOOL ECONOMY
Under one name or another a course in school management is required in the two-
year curricula of all of the Missouri normal schools except Kirksville, and a course
combining school management and the theory of education is required in the fourth
or last semester of the two-year curriculum at the Harris Teachers College. In the
normal schools, the course is commonly covered in a twelve weeks term, five hours a
week. It is partially differentiated from the course in principles of teaching by laying
the chief emphasis upon the problems of classroom technique, including routine, pro-
gram-making, grading and classification, and discipline. The essentials of school
hygiene are also as a rule included in the course, and whatever explicit instruction
the student receives in professional ethics is likely to be given here.
As compared with the courses in the principles and technique of teaching, the in-
struction in school management is likely to reflect the conditions of successful prac-
tice rather than to develop an ideal procedure from a preliminary study of theory.
Most of the rules and precepts of management, indeed, simply formulate the conclu-
sions that generations of teachers have drawn from their experience in organizing
1 Bulletin Number Mght, Carnegie Foundation, New York, 1914, page 85.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : SCHOOL MANAGEMENT 191
schools and managing children, altho modern textbooks usually present these rules
and precepts with some attempt to justify them theoretically. Fundamental questions
of educational theory, however, are very seldom encountered except in the treatment
of discipline, and even here the emphasis is largely upon the specific methods and
devices by means of which order and control may be established and maintained.
RELATION TO OTHEB SUBJECTS
In its relation to the general scheme of curriculum organization which has been dis-
cussed in the preceding sections, the course in school management raises some inter-
esting questions. In the first place, is the distinction between management and teach-
ing a valid distinction? Would it be possible or advisable to combine the materials
of the two courses into a single unified treatment? Does not this very practice of treat-
ing the technique of teaching and the technique of management in separate courses
leave with the student an impression that his later work will be of two distinct types
rather than the conviction that good teaching always involves good management? In
the second place, granting the importance to the young teacher of gaining a famil-
iarity with the approved procedure in organizing and managing a school or a class-
room, would it not be well to bring discussion of this procedure into the closest pos-
sible connection with the classroom situations and problems to which it pertains? In
other words, should not the course in school management parallel the work in observa-
tion and practice teaching and concern itself largely with the problems that actual
classroom teaching involves, utilizing these as texts for the presentation and discus-
sion of methods and devices?
As regards the first group of questions, the advantage of conceiving the act of
teaching as a single process is obvious. On the other hand, there is this justification
for separating the problems of management from those of teaching: the former
should be considered always as subordinate to the latter in the sense that routine,
order, the daily program, and other phases of management exist only for the purpose
of making real teaching possible. If this conception of the function of school man-
agement is kept continually before the students, there will be little danger of over-
emphasizing the significance of the materials of the course, or of considering them as
representing anything more than the technical prerequisites of good teaching. Excel-
lent teaching may in itself solve som<i of the problems of management, particularly
those concerned %with discipline, but the best teaching cannot compensate for unhy-
gienic classroom conditions, for a badly arranged daily program, or for wasteful and
inefficient routine. A separate treatment, however, does not necessarily mean a sepa-
rate course. Where a full semester is available, it is doubtless excellent practice to
combine the materials in a single course.
In respect to the second group of questions, there is every reason to believe that
both school management and the technique of teaching will be taught most effec-
tively if they accompany practice teaching. There are difficulties to be overcome in
192 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
carrying out this plan. The student who takes charge of a practice class is in a some-
what different situation from one who studies technical processes by undertaking
actual work in a shop, a laboratory, or an office, for the blunders of the latter are not
nearly so costly as are those of the amateur teacher. It is obvious that the danger of
initial mistakes in practice teaching must be reduced to a minimum, and consequently
some instruction in the technique both of teaching and of management must be given
prior to the period of actual practice. It should be feasible to provide this prelimi-
nary instruction during the study of classroom work in the term or semester before
practice teaching is undertaken. The sys hematic courses in management and the tech-
nique of teaching could then parallel practice, the various topics being correlated as
far as possible with the problems that emerge in the student's own attempts to or-
ganize, manage, and teach.
(5) OBSERVATION, PARTICIPATION, AND PRACTICE TEACHING
The training school constitutes the characteristic laboratory equipment of a
normal school or teachers college, and the courses in observation, participation, and
practice teaching should be looked upon as the central and critical elements in each
of the curricula. An examination of these courses as they are actually administered
in the Missouri normal schools leads one to the conviction that, fundamental as the
work is asserted to be, its theoretical values are seldom realized in practice. It is not
too much to say, indeed, that the training department is the weakest part of the
structure, and the same thing is probably true in many, if not in most, of the state
normal schools in this country.
(a) SIZE OF THE TRAINING SCHOOL AS RELATED TO NORMAL SCHOOL ENROLMENT
One reason for unsatisfactory conditions in training schools, both in Missouri and
in the country at large, is to be found in the small number of pupils commonly avail-
able for training purposes. Unlike the city training school, the state normal school
has usually no legal connection with the local elementary and high schools. As a
consequence, it cannot commandeer a sufficient number of pupils to provide adequate
practice facilities, and its training school must be built up by the adoption of mea-
sures that are likely to give it a pupil body that is both limited in numbers and un-
representative of normal social conditions. In some cases it becomes a select school
with a * Awaiting list;"" or it may go to the opposite extreme and become a dumping-
ground for difficult pupils that local schools are glad to be rid of. The enrolment is
likely to be small and the practice classes so attenuated in numbers as to aiford little
opportunity for the necessary instruction of the student-teacher.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING 198
CONTROL OF LOCAL SCHOOL FACILITIES INDISPENSABLE
It is unfortunate that normal schools should ever be located in towns so small as
to preclude an abundance of what may be termed the "laboratory" or "clinical"" ma*
terial of a teacher-training program, — namely, elementary and secondary pupils.
Where schools have been thus located, their only salvation lies In an arrangement
whereby all of the local public schools may be available for training-school purposes
under the direct control of the training department of the normal school. Even where
a good sized independent training school is possible, it is extremely desirable for the
local school system to be related to the normal school in such a manner as to afford
opportunity for extensive observation, participation, and practice under wholly nor-
mal conditions. In larger towns and cities, the training school may well be a ward
or district school of the public school system. Care must be taken in organizing a
training school under this plan, and infinite tact must characterize its administration.
There is no doubt, however, that a town, especially a small town, is under great and
constant obligations to a state normal school located within its limits. Nor is there
doubt that a well-managed normal school, with its expert knowledge and its thor-
ough supervision, would almost invariably give such a town a better school or school
system than the town could provide for itself. There is every reason, therefore, why
an arrangement so vital to the school should be required of the community as a con-
dition of retaining the school.
This appropriation of local school facilities for training-school purposes has pro-
ceeded apace during the past few years in various parts of the country, and where
soundly organized has proved successful. Generally speaking, the policies of the school
that is used for training purposes must be determined by the normal school author-
ities; a plan of dual control thru which responsibility and authority are divided be-
tween the local superintendent or school board on the one hand and the normal
school on the other hand is very hard to administer* Where difficulty is found in
winning support for the plan in a community, some financial inducement, such as
the payment of teachers by the normal school, must be resorted to. Even in case of
a state school the character of the situation is of such delicacy that it would probably
be wise to guarantee the community such facilities as it would not purchase for itself,
in return for complete educational control of its schools.
MINIMAL STANDARDS OF PRACTICE FACILITIES
Whatever its arrangements, a normal school should not attempt to attract stu-
dents out of proportion to its laboratory facilities. It becomes important, then, to
agree upon certain minimal standards which will indicate the enrolment that a train-
ing school should have if the normal school is to do the work that it proposes. It is
in connection with practice teaching, rather than with observation and participation,
that the need for a sufficient number of pupils is most imperative; consequently the
size of the "practice class" may be taken as the unit from which to work in construct-
194 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
ing a minimal standard. In the provisional curricula for teacher- training institutions
which were distributed by the Foundation1 in 1917 for criticisms and suggestions,
the minimal size of the practice class was assumed to be twelve pupils. The replies
from the critics of these curricula indicated a general conviction that this minimum
was too low. The questionnaire investigation of training-school organization made by
A. M. Santee2 in 1917 showed the median size of the practice class in seventy state
normal schools to be between fourteen and sixteen pupils. In view of these facts, it is
probable that the unit should number at least fifteen pupils in the sense that the
training school should be able to provide sections of at least this size for all of the
students who are assigned to practice teaching during any one term. This does not
mean that the teaching of smaller sections is not sometimes both desirable and profit-
able. In what has been referred to as " participation," it is often well to have a stu-
dent conduct an exercise with four, five, or six pupils, or even with a single individ-
ual. Practice teaching, however, should be done under conditions measurably sim-
ilar to those of public school organization, and while fifteen pupils would be a much
smaller group than the average public school class, the number is sufficient to present
most of the problems of control, organization, and group teaching with which the
student-teacher should become familiar. For the beginning teacher a class of this size
is to be preferred either to the very large or to the very small group, altho before
completing the coarse each student should have some experience in managing a large
class of thirty to forty pupils.
The total number of pupils needed in the training school is, obviously, not to be de-
termined simply by multiplying the number of pupils in the unit practice class by the
number of student- teachers. In the first place, the student in all likelihood will not
teach during the entire day, consequently one section of pupils will provide practice
for more than one student- teacher. The amount of practice teaching required varies
widely among the different normal schools. In somewhat more than one-half of the
seventy state normal schools already referred to, a full year of teaching is required,
but, in most cases, only one period each day is given to this work. In other schools
the teaching is concentrated within shorter periods, but a longer time is required
each day. In computing the needed enrolment of the training school, therefore, this
variable must be determined in each case. A second factor can for our purposes be
reduced to a constant. While in nearly one-half of all training schools all of the
actual teaching is done by student-teachers, this practice is open to grave criti-
cism. It may be kid down as a fundamental rule of training-school organization that
certainly not more than three-fourths of the work of any training-school pupil
should be under the direction of practice teachers, and the limitation of this propor-
tion to one-half would be much better. By taking into account all of these factors,
1 Curricula Designed for the Professional Preparation of Teachers for American Public Schools, Carnegie Foun-
dation, 1917.
2 The Organization and Administration of Practice Teaching in State Normal Schools, A. M. Santee. See School
and Home Education, September, 1917.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING 195
it would be a relatively simple matter to determine the smallest number of pupils
that must be in attendance upon the training school if the requirements laid down
by the normal school for the courses in practice teaching are to be met. Adding fif-
teen per cent to allow for the relation between enrolment and attendance, and an-
other fifteen per cent as a margin to ensure sections of at least fifteen pupils, simple
formulae may be constructed involving these factors and proportions thus:
if three- fourths of the teaching is to be done by student- teachers ; or
if one-half of the teaching is to be done by student-teachers.
In both of these formulae:
n = minimal training-school enrolment.
s = number of students to whom practice-teaching privileges must be available
each year.
c = number of recitation units during which each student will be in charge of
a section each week.
<m = proportion of total year during which practice teaching is required of each
student.
t = approximate number of recitation units in the training school each week.
(Under ordinary conditions this may be considered as thirty, or six periods
each day for five days.)
It is interesting to apply these formulae to the Missouri normal schools,1 but in
so doing one should remember that the requirements for practice teaching in all of
the schools are unusually low, and that consequently the enrolment in the training
schools, while quite inadequate even to these low requirements, would be hopelessly
deficient if practice teaching were required in all curricula, as it should be, or if the
Enrolment in Training School Actual
Institution if Minimal Standards Enrolment in
had been met Training School
a b
. Kirksville 315 215 145s
Warrensburg 945 630 325
Cape Glrardeau 434 289 161
Springfield 456 304 245
Maryville 216 144 104
a If one-half of the teaching were done by student-teachers.
b If three-fourths of the teaching* were done by student-teachers.
1 In making these calculations, the number of students in the graduating classes (1916) in curricula that include
stated requirements in practice teaching and the time requirements for practice teaching as stated in the catalogue
of the school were used as bases of the computation. The enrolments of the training schools were reported by the
directors of the training departments in the fall of 1917. In taking the number of students who graduate as an index
of the number for whom practice teaching must have been provided, the error, of course, is in favor of the school,
for in all probability fewer students graduate each year (from the curricula requiring practice teaching) than are
enrolled in practice-teaching courses during that year.
2 Enrolment for winter term, 1918-19. No report for 1917.
196
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
present requirements were appropriately increased in the curricula in which practice
teaching now finds a place.
The important point is that all of these institutions are limited in their laboratory
facilities to independent practice schools. On the other hand, the city training schools
and such state normal schools as have taken over the control of local schools are gen-
erally able to provide laboratory facilities in abundance. Harris Teachers College has
under its immediate control, for example, the Wyman School, a typical elementary
school enrolling over one thousand pupils. This school, which adjoins the college
building, is used exclusively for purposes of observation and demonstration, the
actual practice teaching being done in selected elementary schools in various parts
of the city. In general the facilities for observation and practice in the city training
schools are in startling contrast to the facilities in the Missouri normal schools, none
of which has made the cooperative arrangement referred to above. The very large
differences that may exist are illustrated in the following table:
STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS CONTROLLING-
ONE OR MORE LOCAL PUBLIC SCHOOLS
School
Gunnison, Col.1
Harrisonburg, Va.a
Westfield, Mass.1
Dillon, Mont.55
De Kalb, 111.3
Keene, N. H.1
Colle-
giate
Enrol-
ment
Pupils
Avail-
able
Batio
Students
to
Pupils
178
246
1:1.4
289
1000
1 : 3.5
i6r
500
1:3
242
600
1:2.5
405
648
1:1.6
170
1300
1:7.6
STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS LIMITED TO
INDEPENDENT PRACTICE SCHOOLS
School
KirksviUe, Mo.3
Warrensburg, Mo.3
Cape Girardeau, Mo.8
Springfield, Mo.3
Maryville, Mo.3
Valley City, N. D.1
Whitewater, Wis.3
Colle-
Pupils
Ratio
ffiate
Avail-
Student*
Enrol-
able
to
ment
Pupils
530
145
1 : 0.27
514*
325
1:0.63
432
161
1 : 0.37
607
245
1:0.40
200
104
1 : 0.52
327
259
1:0.79
374
211
1 : 0.56
The above table gives simply the gross proportions between the actual number
of students enrolled in the various schools and the number of pupils available for
observation and practice teaching. While this is not a sound basis for determining
whether the laboratory facilities of any one school are adequate, it constitutes a fair
method of contrasting the situation in the two types of schools under discussion.
The table plainly suggests the very great advantage of securing control of the local
public schools for observation and practice teaching. What this would mean for the
four Missouri normal schools that are located in relatively small communities is indi-
cated by the following table:
1 Catalogue, 1918.
3 Catalogue," 1917.
3 The enrolments for the Missouri normal schools are taken from the table given in the report of the State Super-
intendent of Public Instruction for 1916, except that in the case of Cape Girardeau, which apparently failed to re-
port for 1915-16, the figures are for the preceding year. In each case, the enrolment as given includes those students
who were registered from September to May. This excludes the large enrolment in the summer quarter.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING 197
School Total Training Public ScJiool Ratio of Students
Collegiate School Enrolment to Pupils Possible if
Students Enrolment of Normal School controlled
Community Local Schools
Kirksville 530 145 1502 1:2.8
Warrenstmrg 514 335 1007 1 : 2.0
Cape Girardeau 432 161 2035 1:4.7
Maryville 200 104 1027 1:5.1
With such laboratory facilities as this arrangement would provide, the normal
schools of Missouri would be in a position to do their work in a manner befitting
its importance to the state. Certainly no town or city should be the seat of a state
normal school unless it is willing to turn over to the state institution either all of
its local schools or a sufficient number to provide ample facilities for demonstration,
participation, practice teaching, and experimental education. It will almost certainly
profit thereby both educationally and financially, and for the normal school the
arrangement is indispensable. If Kirksville or Warrensburg, for example, had full
use of the local public schools, its laboratory equipment would even then be none too
extensive for the work that it is already under obligation to do.1
(&) HOUSING AND EQUIPMENT OF TRAINING DEPARTMENTS
A second reason for the general inadequacy of the courses in observation and prac-
tice teaching may be found in the subordinate position that the training school has
often been forced to assume in its relationships with other normal school departments.
This subordination is noticeably revealed in the neglect in many cases to provide for
the training school quarters and equipment that are at all comparable either with the
quarters and equipment provided for the normal school classes, or with what the better
school systems provide for their elementary schools.
In Missouri the situation in this respect varies among the different schools. At
Kirksville, a "model" rural school building on the campus houses the twenty or thirty
rural school pupils who are brought in from the surrounding country, but the prac-
tice school proper is quartered in one of the main buildings, partly in small inside
rooms and in a dark basement. Warrensburg had provided a separate training-school
building as early as 1908, and since the fire of 1915 has rebuilt and improved it. Cape
Girardeau has had a separate building for the training school since 1908. It is con-
structed of stone and externally compares well with the main normal school build-
ing; its interior arrangements, however, are not well adapted to its purpose, nor is
the equipment relatively as good as that of the main building, where spacious "soci-
ety" rooms are idle most of the time. At Springfield a small and quite inadequate
building, the "Greenwood School," just off the campus, provides accommodations for
about two hundred pupils representing Grades III to VIII inclusive, while Grades I,
II, IX, and X are located in the basement of the main building; this basement, how-
1 In tlie Province of Ontario, the municipalities in which institutions for the professional preparation of teachers
are located* freely grive over their elementary and secondary schools for observation and practice purposes.
198 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
ever, is high and light, and the situation is better than at Kirksville. At Maryville
the training school occupies commodious and comfortable quarters on the first floor
of the main building.
The conditions at Kirksville are deplorable, and furnish a most uninspiring example
to prospective teachers. When the school was visited in the spring of 1915, the first
two grades were discovered in the basement of the main building in rooms thoroughly
unsuited to the uses to which they were put. One would assume that, if adequate
quarters could not be furnished to all, the smallest and most helpless children would
have first attention; and one would also assume that, if either normal school students
or training-school pupils must find quarters in the basement, it would be the former
rather than the latter, for not only are the former the more mature, but as their daily
programs are the more varied, there is much more movement from room to room, and
the actual time spent in the classroom each day is appreciably shorter. Furthermore,
prospective teachers could have no better object lesson than the assignment of the
best quarters available to the use of the training school. These considerations do not
seem to have appealed to the Kirksville authorities. Not only was the location of the
training-school rooms unfortunate; the furniture in these rooms was in a bad condi-
tion. The desks were hacked and cut, and while some of the desks and seats were
adjustable, the adjustments had either been made carelessly or neglected altogether;
some desk tops stood at a sharp angle.
BAD CONDITIONS EASILY REMEDIED
In practically all of the training schools the hygienic conditions of the classrooms
left much to be desired. Faulty lighting,1 while not universal among the schools, was
met with frequently; the posture of the pupils was noticeably bad in every school
except one; poor blackboards were found all too commonly. If there is any single,
simple thing that the normal school can do in the preparation of teachers, it is to
acquaint its students with hygienic standards, impel them to form habits that will
enable them to look after these matters automatically, and develop in them a sensi-
tiveness to unhygienic conditions that will detect at once defects so easily remedied
as those just mentioned. There may be some excuse for a normal school that fails to
train all of its students adequately to apply every principle of teaching; there can be
no excuse for failure to look after fundamental duties, especially when they demand
but a minimum of thought and depend on simple habits that any one may acquire
if only example and a little drill are added to brief instructions.
The housing and equipment of the training schools, as has been suggested, are
primarily significant to the present discussion because they reveal a characteristic
status of the training department that is fatal to its efficiency. In too many normal
schools throughout the country, the training school is in the "basement," and the
1 Especially lighting from the right hand or from two sides without carein providing shades to prevent cross shadows.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING 199
phrases, "going down for practice," "the people downstairs," and the like, have much
more than a localized vogue, as well as much more than a literal implication.
(c) RELATION BETWEEN THE TRAINING SCHOOL AND OTHER NORMAL SCHOOL DEPART-
MENTS
By far the most significant weakness of the courses in observation, participation,
and practice teaching is the general lack of a satisfactory correlation of all of the work
of the normal school with the training school. Not only does the training school as a
rule occupy a subordinate position in the normal school organization instead of being
the pivotal point and focus of all departments, but the work of the training school
seems in many, if not most, cases to be detached, to lack a fundamental relation to
what is taught and learned in the classrooms "upstairs."" It is no unusual thing for
the normal school student to complain that the theory that has been taught to him
in the courses in psychology, principles of teaching, and special methods (to say
nothing of the purely "academic"" courses) has no perceptible connection with the
work of the training school. This is sometimes due, no doubt, to the fact that the
"theory" is impracticable, and that those responsible for the practice teaching know
it, and in consequence will have no commerce with it; but it is oftener due merely
to a complete mechanical separation of the training department both from the de-
partment of educational theory and from the academic departments, — a separation
which results in the total ignorance of each party regarding what the other is teach-
ing or practising, if not, indeed, in actual opposition or open friction.
LACK OF COOPERATION IN MISSOURI SCHOOLS
A striking example of this lack of cooperation between the training department
and the rest of the school was revealed in the situation that existed in the school at
Warrensburg at the time of the visits made in connection with the present study. A
serious and long-standing cleavage in the faculty as a whole had thrown the training
department and the department of education into opposing camps. Partly because of
this unfortunate condition and partly because the traditions of the normal school had
not granted a central position to the training department, the work of this depart-
ment was completely "a thing apart," bearing no discoverable relation to the other
activities of the institution. Out of fifteen teachers of academic subjects, only one re-
ported that he had assumed any responsibility whatsoever for work in the training
school, and out of eighteen teachers who were asked to express an opinion on the effec-
tiveness of the practice teaching, ten reported unfavorably, seven did not answer the
enquiry, and only one had a favorable opinion.1
1 Some of the replies to the questions regarding the practice teaching are illuminating:
"I am not directly responsible for the supervision of practice teaching in the subjects I teach. I do not share indi-
rectly in such supervision. If there is any working harmony between the department of ... and the training school,
it is incidental or accidental so far as I know or believe."
"Practice teaching under present conditions is markedly inefficient, due partly to frequent changes or shifting
Of practice teachers, partly to conflicts of methods and ideals of supervisors and other teachers . The supervisors
200 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
A sharp contrast to the condition at Warrensburg was found at Kirksville. Here
the members of the academic departments had been encouraged to cooperate with
the training school, with the result that six out of nineteen academic teachers reported
a direct responsibility for the supervision of practice teaching, while six more reported
an indirect responsibility which seemed to indicate at least an intelligent interest.
With this spirit of cooperation, the responses of the academic teachers naturally re-
veal a much more sympathetic attitude toward the work of the school, fourteen report-
ing favorably, seven unfavorably, and six not replying. It is interesting to note that
while the academic teachers of Kirksville were much more inclined to judge the prac-
tice work favorably than were the academic teachers of Warrensburg, the practice
school at Kirksville was judged by the four representatives of the present study to
be inferior to the practice school at Warrensburg, and the tests made in both prac-
tice schools1 showed the same result. The psychological effect -of making a person
responsible in some measure for activities that he would otherwise be disposed to
criticise may be seen in this contrast. If it be argued that there is a danger in this,
it may likewise be urged that hearty cooperation, while tending to gloss over some
defects, can much more easily be turned toward progress than can divided and mutu-
ally repellent interests with their jealousies and misunderstandings.
At Kirksville, however, a commendable interest in the training school on the part
of the academic staff is somewhat offset by an anomalous lack of cooperation between
the training department and the department of education. The head of the latter de-
partment, who himself teaches practically all of the classes in educational theory, has
no official means of knowing how his theories work in practice, nor has the director of
the practice school an official relationship to the work in theory. The most obvious
defect of the organization at Kirksville, and the one that is doubtless chiefly responsi-
ble for the weakness of the training school as a school, lies in the lack of something
that is just as important as cooperation ; namely, a centralization of administrative
authority. This is theoretically provided for in the office of "Supervisor of Practice
Schools," which has been assumed by the president in addition to his other duties. In
so far as could be determined, however, this officer fails to direct and coordinate the
work of the supervisors, and the principal of the practice school, who is a director of
training only by courtesy, has no authority for the purpose. Each individual super-
visor is essentially a law unto himself, making his own course of study for the different
of ... practice teaching and the members of the faculty in ... should be in close cooperation, or the training school
. . . should be under the supervision of the . . . department."
"I have nothing to do with the practice teaching:. It sometimes happens that the methods in the training school
and those presented in my own classes are very different.'1
" I am not permitted to do any such supervisory work. Of course I could visit as an outsider. I know there is no
relation between [my subject] in the normal school and in the training school. I should like to attempt to relate
the two but was told such is in no way my work."
"My view really is that the training school is the laboratory of the normal school. I should like to work out many
things there. An entire readjustment of the relation of the training school and our normal work is, I think, vitally
necessary, if we ever reach efficiency."
"... closer correlation and more unity between methods of academic departments and those of training-school
supervisors would be of some advantage,"
1 See pages 443ff.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING
grades, and determining Ms own standards of progress both for the student- teachers
under his control and for the pupils in their classes. Cooperation of academic depart-
ments in the work of the training school is indispensable to the best work, but to turn
each department of the training school over bodily to the corresponding academic
department which goes its own separate way is not cooperation but dismemberment.
Kirksville and Warrensburg represent two undesirable extremes; the other schools
will fall somewhere between the two as far as the organization of the training-school
work is concerned* At Cape Girardeau, the head of the training department gives cer-
tain of the courses in theory, but he is not responsible for all of the theoretical work.
The academic departments apparently have little interest in the training school. At
Springfield, the head of the training department is also head of the department of
education, including psychology, and in this way a praiseworthy coordination of the
courses in theory and practice is ensured. The relations with the academic depart-
ments are also much more intelligent and cordial than at Cape Girardeau and War-
rensburg, Teachers of academic subjects, some occasionally and others frequently,
teach school classes to illustrate their courses in special methods; this is particularly
true of the teachers who have charge of the methods courses in arithmetic and geog-
raphy. So far as could be learned, however, this cooperation is informal. At Mary-
ville, too, the department of education and the training school are under a single
head, but there is no official relation between these departments and the academic
departments, and the teachers of the academic subjects are apparently unconcerned
as to the work of the training school.
DIFFICULTIES OF COOPERATION
There are many difficulties in the way of effecting a thoroughly unitary organiza-
tion of normal school work. Subject-matter specialists find it hard to see the ele-
mentary and secondary programs as wholes, for their own subjects naturally loom
large in every view that they take; furthermore, they often lack the personal equip-
ment and the specialized training that should characterize a good critic. As has al-
ready been said of the curricula of the normal schools, a curriculum framed for a
practice school by a committee of subject-matter specialists is almost certain to be a
compromise among the different claimants for time and precedence rather than a well-
articulated structure in which the needs of the pupils for a balanced and unified pro-
gram of instruction are the sole criteria for the selection and arrangement of mate-
rials. A second difficulty lies in the practical impossibility of administering a practice
school on the committee plan. Here centralized authority, balanced by centralized
responsibility, is a sww qua non of efficiency.
ORGANIZED COOPERATION
The desired interlinking of all normal school departments with the training school
is certainly not to be realized by turning over the practice teaching to the control
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
either of the general normal school faculty or of a committee representing the vari-
ous academic departments. The training school must be under the direct control and
supervision of an expert administrator fitted by experience and by specialized train-
ing for this type of work, and this director or superintendent must have under his
immediate charge a corps of carefully selected and specifically trained critics or super-
visors. The supervisory staff should include many, if not most, of the members of
the so-called academic departments, and the entire group should form what might
be termed a training-school "cabinet." This body should legislate upon all matters
concerning the organization of the training-school curriculum and questions of edu-
cational policy; the superintendent or director, as the officer in whom administrative
responsibility is lodged, should have authority to make decisions upon all matters of
administration, with the provision that any other member of the cabinet may appeal
from his decisions to a higher administrative authority.
A plan of this sort would ensure (1) the administrative autonomy of the practice
school under a single responsible head, and (£) the responsible cooperation of all
academic departments and all members of the critic staff in the organization of the
school, the construction of the curriculum, and the oversight of the student-teachers.
The chief difficulty in carrying out this plan under present conditions is serious but
not insurmountable. It would require that appointments to all important positions
in the academic departments be limited to persons who are qualified by personality,
experience, and training to participate in the responsibilities that it is proposed to
delegate to the members of the practice school cabinet. It would mean, in other words,
that there would be but a very subordinate place in the normal school organization,
or none at all, for the teacher who is merely a specialist in his subject-matter. The
requirement of the special abilities needed for intelligent cooperation is after all
nothing but the characteristic differentia of a professional school for teachers, and
should be faced as frankly as similar restrictions are faced in all other genuinely pro-
fessional institutions.
Needless to say, the relationship between the department of education and the
training department should be particularly close and intimate, and to this end it is
advisable, we believe, to combine the headship of the department of education and
the directorship of the training department in one and the same person. The other
members of the staff in education should also have definite responsibilities in the ad-
ministration and supervision of the training school to the end that every class in edu-
cational theory may be in charge of a teacher who is in daily touch with the actual
problems of teaching and management in an elementary or a secondary school.
(d) THE APPRENTICE SYSTEM AS BELATED TO THE UNIFICATION OF COURSES
In so far as the coordination of all courses is concerned, the Harris Teachers College
stands in sharp contrast with even the best of the state normal schools. Each instructor
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING 203
apparently works with a perfect knowledge of what the other instructors are doing,1
and all instructors make a large use of the facilities which the Wyman School offers
for observation and demonstration. The actual work of practice teaching, however,
is conducted on the apprentice plan, the principal of the school to which the cadet,
is sent being chiefly responsible for the work, altho his supervision is supplemented by
that of the regular supervisors of the school system. Thus a dualism quite analogous
to that existing in the state normal schools is brought into existence at a most crit-
ical point. The characteristics of the system may be summarized as follows:
DEFECTS AND ADVANTAGES OF THE SYSTEM AT ST. Louis
1. The teachers who have conducted the courses in theory and observation are in no
position to ensure the success of their students or of their theories in practice. Indeed,
the principal in charge of a cadet may be out of sympathy with the ideals of the col-
lege, and the student may be quite unable to carry out in practice the principles taught
there. In at least two of the elementary schools visited in 1915 and 1916, a situation
of this sort was apparent.
2. The amount and especially the quality of the supervision that the student-teacher
receives under this system are extremely variable. In many cases the actual supervision
of the practice is delegated to the classroom teachers in whose rooms the cadets chance
to be working. Altho selected for their merit, very few of these teachers are skilled in
the difficult work of training beginners, and while in some cases, no doubt, the results
are excellent, this fortunate outcome must be looked upon as more or less accidental.
3. Nor are the principals themselves always competent for the task of directing
the beginner. Like the teachers, they vary widely, both as to their ideals of what con-
stitutes good teaching and as to their ability to point out defects and suggest reme-
dies. Altho in many cases, as one might infer, they do most creditable work, the ap-
prentice must run a chance of assignment to a principal who, however good he may
be from other points of view, is not a good supervisor of beginning teachers.
It may be urged that these disadvantages, even if they are admitted, do not con-
stitute a serious indictment of the apprentice system, for after leaving the training
school the young teacher will in any case run chances of working under incompetent
supervision. This contention overlooks the fact that teachers who have been well
started in the development of an effective technique will to that extent be safeguarded
against the dangers of this incompetence. If it be granted that the supervision of be-
ginners is a difficult task, requiring both exceptional native qualities and specialized
training, it should follow that the initial practice teaching may best be undertaken
under the immediate and responsible supervision of well-equipped critics who give the
bulk of their time and energy to this task.
1 When Harris Teachers College was visited, the entire facility was in the midst of a careful review of the curricu-
lum, topic by topic in each course. This is a periodic occurrence, and is undertaken less for the purpose of revision
than to guarantee a perfect mutual understanding on the part of each instructor as to just what his contribution
is to be and with what order and emphasis it should be made to take its place in the complete scheme.
204 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
The apprentice system as carried out in St. Louis has an advantage in that the free-
dom, granted to the principals in directing the work of the cadets has led to the devis-
ing of various methods of conducting their training. The following account reported
from one school suggests the plan that is generally followed :
At the beginning of the term, the cadet is sent to the first grade, and studies the
organization of the school as the pupils come from the kindergarten. A week or
two is devoted to this work, and at the end of this period the teaching is begun.
The cadet teaches one-half of the time. The program is so constructed as to af-
ford an opportunity to teach every subject in all grades, altho the progress from
grade to grade is not necessarily consecutive. Every Friday morning the prin-
cipal has a conference with the cadet, discussing the work chiefly from the point
of view of method and sequence. Occasionally the cadet takes a room for a half-
day, carrying all of the work during the session. This is invariably preceded by
a conference with the classroom teacher in which the work is gone over care-
fully. On such occasions, the principal gives the cadet thoroughgoing supervision
and criticism. During the last two weeks of the semester, the cadet has charge
of rooms for the entire day. Lesson plans are prepared for all lessons until the
principal is satisfied of the cadet's ability to plan work well; these plans are sub-
mitted sometimes to the classroom teacher and sometimes to the principal.
While the practice teaching observed in the school from which this plan is quoted
was excellent, the teaching in other schools was noticeably defective, and in some
cases there was apparently no attempt to correct the defects. Particularly significant
was the deficiency in classroom technique of some of the beginners — a phase of teach-
ing-skill which expert supervision can quickly influence.
SUGGESTED IMPROVEMENTS
As a result of observations in St. Louis, one is disposed to conclude provisionally
that the apprentice system as the sole method of organizing student-teaching is not
satisfactory, and that intensive training in a well-organized and expertly supervised
practice school will ensure with greater certainty the formation of good teaching
habits. If, on the other hand, the supervision of principals and classroom teachers
could be supplemented and directed by expert critics from the college, the marked
advantages of the apprentice system might be preserved and many, if not most, of its
weaknesses might be eliminated. The ideal solution of the problem would provide pre-
liminary participation and responsible practice in a school attached directly to the
college, followed by apprentice work in selected schools under the joint supervision of
the regular principals and of the supervisory staff at the college.
From the point of view of progress in the professional preparation of teachers it is
particularly fortunate that the apprentice system has been given so thorough a trial
in St. Louis. Certainly if this system could succeed anywhere, it would succeed in
a well -articulated city system where the principals represent in general a high type of
professional ability, where they have time and incentive for organizing the super-
vision of practice teachers, and where the uniformity of curriculum and textbooks
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING 205
makes possible a very specific and intensive mastery of subject-matter by the pro-
spective teacher. If the purely apprenticeship or "cadet" system falls short under
these favorable conditions, it could hardly be expected to succeed if attempted on a
large scale in normal schools not officially connected with the public schools to which
their cadets are sent, and where it would be impossible in the curriculum to forecast
so faithfully the varying elementary programs of many towns. Even in such schools,
however, there would be a large advantage in the double arrangement just suggested,
— the provision of preliminary practice facilities in direct connection with the normal
school itself and a supplementary period of apprenticeship under the joint supervi-
sion of the normal school critic staff and the superintendents, principals, and class-
room teachers of cooperating systems.
Notwithstanding these strictures upon the apprentice system as worked out in St.
Louis, it is the conviction of the observers that the work of the Harris Teachers Col-
lege, including its admirable system of extension courses for graduates, represents a
highly efficient type of teacher- training, and deserves to stand in many ways as a
model for normal schools and teachers colleges throughout the country.
(e) SPIRIT AND MORALE OF THE PRACTICE SCHOOLS
A serious handicap to the efficiency of a practice school is the difficulty of ensuring
on the part of the pupils a proper attitude toward the work of the school. Pupils
are not always inclined to take the student-teacher seriously, and this means that the
work which the student- teacher represents is not taken seriously. The problem is not
insoluble, for some practice schools are characterized by a most commendable spirit of
industry and cooperation. Among the state normal schools of Missouri, for example,
Springfield furnishes a striking illustration of efficiency in training-school organi-
zation from this point of view. But in some of the other institutions, conditions in
the practice school at the time when the visits were made were little short of des-
perate. The following excerpts from the visitors' notes will indicate types of difficulty
in administering practice teaching that are by no means limited to the Missouri
schools :
GRADE III. A section of eleven pupils in nature study. The violet is being studied.
The pupils are inattentive and disorderly. The student-teacher corrects a boy for
whispering, and he responds by "making a face," meantime continuing with, his
whispering. The pupils are especially disorderly while the teacher is writing upon
the blackboard. They whisper, talk, and tickle one another. There is no interest
in the work of the class, A supervisor enters, and the class at once becomes at-
tentive and orderly.
GRADE VI. A class in arithmetic. Blackboard work is in progress when the ob-
server enters. At the close of the period another student-teacher takes charge
of one-half of the class. There is some confusion in making the change. The
new teacher is besieged by six or seven pupils, each clamoring to have his ques-
tion answered first, and all talking in high voices.
206 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
Teacher: " Every one take their seats."
A lesson in history is begun; the assignment for the next day9 s work is given
Teacher: "For to-morrow, take the Dutch revolt against Spain."
Pupil (roughly) : "Take what? "
Teacher: "The next chapter."
There is a great deal of noise and confusion, and little attention to the work
in hand. The pupils open and close the desk-tops needlessly, noisily, and re-
peatedly; they play listlessly but noisily with pencils, and ink-well covers. When
called upon they stand to recite, but rise lazily and slouch over their desks
when half erect. One boy comes sauntering into the room, hands in pockets, ten
minutes after the exercise begins. The pupils interrupt the recitation with irre-
sponsible and sometimes "funny" questions. The student-teacher calls for better
order, and for a time there is a slight improvement. The section includes five
boys and sixteen girls ; there are also in the room two normal school students
who have apparently been assigned to "observe" the work
GRADE VIII. Physiology. The section includes six girls and eight boys. The class
shows little spirit for the work. The pupils tend to recite without thinking, and
give other evidences of irresponsibility. There is much shuffling of feet and mum-
bling in undertones. One girl tries to take a pencil from a neighbor's hands; the
two then smirk and giggle. Some of the pupils attempt to create merriment by
making either crudely humorous or semi-impudent statements. There is a good
deal of "horse-play" among the boys — such as slapping on the back, followed
by exaggerated expressions of pain on the part of the one struck. The lesson deals
with the problem of good health, and seems well adapted to the needs and attain-
ment of the pupils — but they will have none of it. The bell rings and the teacher
hastily gives the assignment: "For to-morrow, self-control and cigarettes."
GKADE I. A section is having a word drill (with cards) under the direction of
a practice teacher. The pupils are inattentive and disorderly. The work is appar-
rently too easy.
GRAPE V. A practice teacher has charge of a section of thirteen boys in hand-
work. The making of a blotter holder is the project. The teacher is giving direc-
tions to individual pupils; the remaining pupils are generally idle but not at
first disorderly. It seems that the scissors are not ready and a pupil is sent for
them. The order relaxes as the work proceeds. The teacher requests the pupils
not to "speak out," but the request is unheeded, and the teacher answers the
questions just as willingly when the pupils do " speak out."
GBADE IX. Algebra under a practice teacher (a young man). The attention is
good at the outset, but the pupils rapidly become listless and inattentive as the
work proceeds. They mumble in speaking and lean inertly against the desks
when standing for recitation.
GBADE IV. Thirteen boys and one girl form a language section in charge of a
practice teacher. The pupils are very disorderly, and not infrequently impudent.
As the observer enters, one pupil is scrambling on the floor, having apparently
been pushed from his seat by a neighbor, — altho the impulse of the push was
quite likely supplemented by the boy himself. There is much confused talking.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING 207
One pupil tells another to "shut up." The teacher pleads, — "Boys, you must be
still;" but no results follow from this admonition.
GRADE V. A language lesson. Discussion of the work of the undertaker. The
class is disorderly, the pupils interrupting the teacher and one another on the
slightest pretext. The teacher's admonitions are not effective.
GRADE V. A geography lesson on Montgomery and Birmingham, Alabama. Pupils
chime in freely 3 speaking very loudly. Turmoil finally results. The teacher checks
the irresponsible "guessing" of the pupils, but the class still remains somewhat
turbulent.
It would be unjust to infer that all of the practice teaching involves these unfor-
tunate conditions. One may always find at least a few practice teachers who thru
native charm or good luck or both have managed to create many of the conditions
that make for effective school work. But too frequently the practice school is an un-
ruly school in so far as the practice classes themselves are concerned. In Springfield,
on the contrary, and undoubtedly in certain other normal schools scattered through-
out the country, the practice school is so organized and administered that practically
all student- teachers are able from the outset to work with the full confidence that
the attitude of the pupils will be positive rather than negative. A subtle spirit of
cooperation and good will has been made to characterize the pupil-body as a whole.
This is a contrast that demands further examination.
REASONS FOR Low MORALE
Back of the unfortunate condition described there usually lurks a definite and
plausible theory of preparing teachers. Modern educational doctrines, it is urged, de-
mand that the teacher "hold" his pupils thru interest and activity rather than thru
force or the show of authority. To prepare teachers to maintain order thru interest
and personal leadership, the conditions of the practice class, it is argued, must involve
a similar demand. As a matter of fact, a consistent effort to carry out this theory will
lead inevitably to the kind of school and the kind of work pictured in the above note-
book extracts. The more unfortunate tendencies of the policy may be summarized as
follows :
1. The pupils are quick to take advantage of the fact that the student-teacher has
no effective authority. This leads not only to slack work on their part, but also to
cumulative experiments in disorder to determine how far lapses from the stated rules
may be carried.
2. The teacher, recognizing the conditions but lacking personal authority to check
them, is unwilling to appeal for aid to the superintendent or supervisor because of
the belief that to do this will be a confession of inability to master the situation.
His tendency, then, is to hide or overlook the inattention and mischief of the pupils,
trusting that the supervisors will not find out how unfortunate lie conditions really
are? — a policy in which lie is often abetted by the pupils themselves, who assume
208 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
a righteous and industrious attitude while the supervisor is present, only to drop it
when his back is turned.
3. Under these circumstances the student-teacher is almost certain to become self-
conscious and diffident — and at this very critical initial point the loss of self-confi-
dence is a most serious matter. Altho expected to hold the attention of his pupils thru
masterly teaching, he finds himself so overwhelmed by disciplinary troubles which the
ineffective means at his disposal cannot dissolve that the first condition of masterly
teaching — a genuine rapport between teacher and pupil — is never firmly established.
4. The policy in question encourages loose and inefficient supervision. Pupils may
misbehave, but their misbehavior is part of the "situation" that the student- teacher
"must learn to master:" it need not trouble the supervisor as one of his individual
responsibilities. The student-teacher, lacking real authority, cannot indulge in pun-
ishments that might be complained of by pupils and parents. The school may conse-
quently become thoroughly degenerate, while the superintendent or principal finds
a safe refuge in his theory that the student- teachers must be thrown upon their own
resources, and that to give them effective aid in the treatment of disciplinary problems
will be to rob them of the most important educative experiences that their training
can provide. This does not mean that all disorderly practice schools are in charge of
lazy and inefficient supervisors, but simply that the theory of the policy stated above
is too convenient not to be embraced and proclaimed by a person who is willing and
anxious to shift disagreeable responsibilities and avoid irritating issues.
LAISSEZ-FAIRE POLICY A MISTAKE
The policy itself, we think, is a mistaken one. It is extremely doubtful whether the
best results in the training of teachers can be obtained when the beginner is con-
fronted with a situation, all of the problems of which must be solved at once. Far
better is it to let him concentrate upon one problem, — the problem of instruction,
—ensuring thru other means an effective attitude upon the part of the pupils. It
should not be inferred that the student-teacher is simply to instruct the class, while
a critic teacher or supervisor stands by to preserve order; the object is rather the
creation among the pupils of a good "school spirit ^ that will be favorable toward the
work of the student- teacher. As has been suggested, this is not an impossible con-
dition to fulfil. A competent principal can develop such a spirit within two or three
years' time — even with a group of pupils who have been pretty thoroughly spoiled
under a loose and ineffective regime. The welfare of the pupils of a practice school
should be the primary consideration in determining the policy to be adopted in ad-
ministering practice teaching, — and certainly a policy that permits children to do
poor work term after term is most detrimental to their welfare. Furthermore, it can
hardly be expected that a school conducted on the laissez-faire principle will appeal
strongly to the community when the question arises of giving the normal school con-
trol of the local school system. Where this policy prevails now the citizens are fully
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING 209
aware that their own schools are preferable, and no training school should demand
control unless it is fully conscious of its ability to conduct practically a better school
or school system than would otherwise exist.
The most unfortunate results of a procedure which prevents the development of
a wholesome morale in a training school are the low standards of order and attainment
that the young teacher is likely to have firmly fixed by the experiences of practice
teaching. If the training school in effect accepts wilful disorder and scamped work upon
the part of pupils as matters of course, the student-teacher is more than likely to enter
the service with a similar tendency. It becomes natural for him, in judging his own
work and its results, to use a standard that falls far short both of the actual abilities
of the pupils and of the reasonable demands of the community. Not a few teachers who
might easily stimulate their pupils to larger achievement fail to do so because they
have no adequate conception of the possibilities ; their pupils do as well as the pupils
in the training schools that the teacher has so recently left, or perhaps somewhat bet-
ter.1 The spirit and morale of their schools, while leaving much to be desired, is prob-
ably no worse than the spirit and morale of the practice classes. Surely (such a teacher
may argue) if the great state school can do no better, I should not be expected to
surpass its standard.
Where normal school graduates go into well-supervised schools, the pressure of
criticism is likely to bring about a speedy reconstruction of ideas, — a process which
often does much to destroy the teacher's confidence in his Alma Mater, and a process
the necessity for which has caused some normal schools to fall very low in the estima-
tion of superintendents and principals who have had to make over their products. The
graduate who teaches in a school that is poorly supervised, or entirely unsupervised,
will miss even this corrective, and will almost inevitably perpetuate the low standards
that the practice classes have set.
TRAINING SCHOOL TESTS SHOW Low STANDARDS
The level to which practice classes may fall is clearly indicated in the results of
the tests that were conducted in the Missouri training schools in the spring and fall
of 1916.2 In practically all of the tests for which well-established norms are avail-
able,3 the results in most of the training schools are poor. There are notable excep-
tions ; Cape Girardeau and Springfield generally do better than the remaining schools ;
single grades in each of the schools make very creditable records in certain of the tests;
and the standing of all of the schools in the reading tests is good. The superiority
*A young teacher whose practice work at the state normal school had been very discouraging to her declared
that in her first school after leaving the normal school there were no pupils as dull or intractable as those with
whom she had been given practice worlc. It was found that this latter group, a small one recruited from the mis-
fits of the city schools, actually contained a large proportion of sub-normal children. The effect of this condition
upon an inexperienced teacher, especially if combined with the policy of "soft" discipline, may be imagined.
3 See pages 443 ff.
3 It is true that these standards represent in the main the achievements of pupils in city school systems j but should
not the state normal school aim to secure in its training schools at least the attainment of the average city school ?
210 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
in reading cannot, however, be considered as counterbalancing the inferiority in the
remaining subjects. In practically all of the training schools, the primary departments
are decidedly better than the intermediate and upper grade departments. The funda-
mental work in reading in consequence is quite generally well done. The practice
teacher in the primary grades also has an advantage over the practice teacher in the
upper grades, for the younger children do not draw the distinction between practice
teachers and "regular15 teachers that their more sophisticated brothers and sisters in
the upper grades are prone to make. Morale is a less serious problem, and the dele-
terious influence of poor morale upon the attainments of the pupils will be less
noticeable.
There was little question in the minds of those engaged in the present study that
the low morale of the practice classes was in large part responsible for the poor re-
sults. There is, indeed, a close correlation between the ranking of the training schools
as determined by the combined judgment of the three observers who in 1915 examined
them and the ranking as determined by the tests applied in 1916 ; in the case of only
one of the schools (Cape Girardeau) was there a noticeable discrepancy between these
two rankings. An observer will almost inevitably judge a school primarily upon the
basis of its spirit as revealed in the evidences of industry, whole-souled effort, and
thoroughgoing cooperation among pupils and between pupils and teachers; conse-
quently a direct correlation between observers' ratings and the rank-order determined
by objective tests is likely to mean a direct correlation between morale on the one
hand and good results in school work on the other hand.
It is, of course, not impossible to secure good objective results when the spirit of
the school leaves much to be desired. In the opinion of the observers, for example,
the training school at Cape Girardeau was inferior to that at Springfield in this
respect, and yet the results of the tests were decidedly better in the former school.
The explanation is to be found, we believe, (1) in the organization of the training de-
partment at Cape Girardeau, which provided a system of supervision especially watch-
ful of objective results, and (2) in the emphasis that has been given to the standard
tests both in the training school and in the classes in theory.
The situation thus revealed raises an important question that has not as yet been
satisfactorily answered in the discussions of educational standards; namely, How far
may accomplishment as measured by the standard tests be taken as a true index of
a school's efficiency? It is clear that measured performance cannot constitute the only
criterion of worth; at least until the scales and tests cover a much larger proportion
of the desirable results of education than do those now available. Objective mea-
sures, then, must be supplemented by the judgment of observers whose training and
experience have made them sensitive to conditions that objective tests cannot yet de-
tect. When both measures point in the same direction, an element of strength attaches
to the verdict that could not be secured thru the operation of either factor alone.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING
(f) COURSES IN OBSEEVATION AS PREREQUISITE TO PRACTICE TEACHING
Exercises in a observation" are commonly listed among the courses prescribed for
the training of teachers. The requirements vary, however, both in nature and in amount
in different schools. Among the Missouri institutions, Kirksville, Cape Girardeau, and
Maryville make no stated requirements in observation; while much emphasis is given
to this work in the Harris Teachers College and in the Springfield State Normal
School. Warrensburg stands about midway between the two extremes, requiring work
in observation but not giving it unusual attention.
So many criticisms have been made of the impractical and perfunctory exercises
often attempted under the name of observation that successful experience with this
work deserves close study. If a preliminary, concrete study of the actual procedure or
technique of an art is needed anywhere, it is needed in the preparation of teachers; to
send a normal school student to responsible practice teaching before he has had an
opportunity to observe and study good teaching is unjust to the student, to say
nothing of the pupils; it is like forcing the surgeon's instruments into the hands of
the medical student who has never witnessed an operation. It will be well, then, to
describe somewhat fully the way in which observation is organized, especially in the
schools where particular emphasis is placed upon it.
LESSONS FOE DEMONSTRATION AT ST. Louis
Adjacent to themain building of the Harris Teachers College is the Wyman School,
a typical elementary school of the St. Louis system, comprising a kindergarten and
Grades I-VIII inclusive. The building is a large, modern structure, well suited to the
needs of a school for observation or demonstration, and is connected by a covered way
with the main college building. This school is used exclusively for purposes of demon-
stration. There is no independent course in observation, but every course offered by
the college may be illustrated by lessons presented in the Wyman School; and partly
perhaps because the college has no direct control of practice teaching, a very large use
is made of these exceptional facilities for observation. The school enrolls over one
thousand pupils, and the work is organized on St. Louis's well-known quarterly plan,
which means in a large school that classes not more than ten weeks apart in progress
will be available for observation at all times. This makes it possible to illustrate al-
most any point that may come up. The general practice is for the instructor in the
college to arrange with the principal of the Wyman School and with one of the class-
room teachers to have a lesson of the desired type given at a certain time. During
the regular period for the meeting of -the college class, the students go over and spend
from twenty to thirty minutes in observing the lesson. They then return to the col-
lege classroom, where the results are discussed.
The conspicuous features of the work in observation at the Harris Teachers Col-
lege are (1) its close articulation with the subject-matter and methods courses, and
(2) its very careful organization. One visiting these classes gains the impression that
212 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
the work is considered by all concerned to be distinctly important. There is nothing
perfunctory or formal about it. The Wyman School is in a very real sense the edu-
cational laboratory of the college.
COURSES IN OBSERVATION AT THE SPRINGFIELD NORMAL SCHOOL
At Springfield a separate course in observation covering a full term, five hours each
week, is a prerequisite to practice teaching. It follows the introductory course in
psychology and a twelve weeks course in school management. The classes in observa-
tion are differentiated with reference to the grade of teaching for which the student is
preparing.1 The course carries the same credit as do other courses meeting five times
each week. In addition to the actual exercises in observation and discussion, each stu-
dent is expected to do reference reading and to make out lesson plans; occasionally,
too, a student is called upon to teach a class under the direction of the supervisor in
charge of the class; all work in observation is under the direction of members of the
training-school staff.
Observation courses at Springfield are conceived as a connecting link between the-
ory and practice, and hold a detached and independent place instead of being woven
into the fabric of the courses in subject-matter and educational theory. This is prob-
ably the only type of work in observation that can be profitably developed in a nor-
mal school with limited laboratory facilities. In a school like Springfield most of the
available pupils must be reserved as material for practice teaching, and a large school
for demonstration in which any instructor may arrange at any time for class exercises
that will illustrate his work is out of the question under the present organization*
Exercises in observation are in consequence limited to specific courses in charge of
members of the training-school staff who are in a position to make the best use of
the available classes. In general, whatever work the selected class is doing when the
observers make their visit must serve as the basis of study and discussion. That even
under these limitations the work may be made to yield good returns, the experience
at Springfield seems abundantly to testify. Compared with the work at the Harris
Teachers College, it has serious shortcomings, but it is vastly better than no contact
whatsoever with the training school, and constitutes a distinct advance over the
perfunctory exercises in observation that are not infrequently found in state normal
and city training schools.
DEMONSTRATION TEACHING AT WARRENSBITRG
Theoretically, the arrangement for work in observation at Warrensburg is the same
as at Springfield, — a twelve weeks course preceding practice teaching and providing
a bridge from the courses in theory. Practically, however, the work did not seem to
1 Those looking forward to primary work observe for four weeks in Grades I and II, for four weeks in Grades HI
and IV, and for four weeks in Grades V and VI; those expecting to do upper grade work follow the same general
plan except that they begin with Grade III and end with Grade VIII ; those preparing for rural school teaching
observe in each of the eight grades.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING £13
be so effectively organized and administered as at Springfield. This was doubtless
due in part to the unfortunate conditions as to housing that confronted the War-
rensburg training school at the time the visits were made. As at Springfield, the
work is in charge of the training-school staff and consists primarily of lessons for de-
monstration given by the supervisors and the superintendent, and followed by class
discussions.
(g) SUPERVISION OF PEACTICE TEACHING
From the standpoint both of the pupils' progress in the practice school and of the
student- teacher's growth in skill, the amount and quality of supervision are matters
of prime consideration. Along with adequate schools for demonstration and practice,
an institution for the training of teachers needs a staff of well-trained supervisors
and critics and a carefully organized system of directing the work of its students in
training.
(i) THE SUPEBVISOKY STAFF
RATIO OF SUPERVISORS TO STUDENT-TEACHEKS
Several attempts have been made to establish a minimal standard for the ratio of
supervisors to the number of students in practice-teaching courses.1
STATUS AND EQUIPMENT OF SUPERVISORS AND CRITIC TEACHERS
The importance of their work demands that supervisors and critieteachers rank with
other normal school teachers both as to salary and professional status. This means that
the qualifications demanded of appointees to supervisory and critic positions should
be comparable in every way to the qualifications demanded of teachers of academic
and professional subjects. They might well, indeed, be superior. It is in the relatively
low status accorded to the supervisors and critics in comparison with the teachers of
academic subjects that the normal schools as a group have made one of their most
serious mistakes. In the study of practice teaching already referred to,2 it was found
that the median average salary of critic teachers in forty-six state normal schools was
$1036, while the median average salary of academic teachers in thirty-six schools was
1 Whether a normal school has an adequate supervisory staff can usually be determined, however, only by an ex-
amination of the system of practice teaching and the system of supervision in each particular case. The extent to
which academic instructors participate in the work of supervision as well as the ""teaching: load " of all supervisors
must be taken into account With this understanding the equivalent of one fall-time supervisor to every eight stu-
dent-teachers may well be accepted as a desirable standard. Judd and Parker, for example, suggest 1 : 8 as the low-
est possible admissible ratio, and Kelly, writing in 19i5, reports for sixty-eight state normal schools a median ratio of
1 : 14. Santee, in his study of practice teaching in seventy state normal schools, asked each school to state the small-
est number of student-teachers in charge of a single supervisor and the largest number of student-teachers in charge
of a single supervisor ; the median in the former instance was six, with a range from one to forty ; the median in the
latter instance was fourteen, with a range from two to fifty. (C. H. Judd and S. C. Parker: Problems involved in
Standardizing Normal Schools. United States Bureau of Education, Bulletin No. 12, 1916t page 89. F. J. Kelly : What
Training School Facilities are provided in State Normal Schools, in Educational Administration and Supervision,
vol. i, pp. 591 ff. A. M. Santee: The Organization and Administration of Practice Teaching in StateNormal Softools,
in School and Home Education, September, 1917, pages 8 ff.)
2 A. M. Santee: op. dt.
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
$1488. In the Missouri schools the salary differences are not so noticeable,1 but the
differences in training are striking; while ninety-three per cent of the teachers of
academic subjects have had the equivalent of four years' collegiate education, only
twenty-seven per cent of the supervisors have so extensive a background for their
work.
As a matter of general policy in normal school administration, the larger the recog-
nition and the more attractive the rewards given to the expert whose class work is to
be the model for the normal school student to emulate, the more clearly will the school
emphasize its function as an institution for preparing teachers. The teacher who, in
addition to possessing a thorough and appropriate education, can teach and manage
a class expertly well, and can successfully show others how to do it, should be placed
well above the teacher of academic and professional classes who lacks this power.
Such ability is the very heart and soul of professional training, and to refuse to recog-
nize it is to Ignore the very object for which the normal school exists.
(u) METHODS OF SUPERVISION
Before proceeding to a discussion of the practices in Missouri, it seems desirable
to indicate briefly the forms of supervision that appear to have justified themselves
in successful experience. In the better normal schools, efforts to ensure the growth of
the student-teacher take a variety of forms. Lesson plans are required, and these must
be approved by the supervisor before the lessons are taught. The practice classes are
visited, and the work of the student-teacher is inspected and criticised. Sometimes
the visiting supervisor leaves with the teacher a written criticism; at other times the
two meet for a personal conference; and occasionally a supervisor will take the class
and show the teacher just how a topic is to be treated or a difficulty overcome. Super-
visors not only meet students individually for conferences regarding work done or in
prospect, but they also meet groups of student-teachers who are engaged in similar
work, while all of the student-teachers may be brought together at periodic intervals
for a general conference on the work of the school as a whole. Nor are the conferences
limited to those in which the student-teachers participate. In good normal schools
all of the supervisors meet at least fortnightly and usually once each week to compare
notes, to discuss this or that teacher's points of weakness and strength, and to agree
upon methods of solving the double problem of developing the student-teacher and
conserving the welfare of the practice classes. In some normal schools, too, much is
made of the "critique3* or exhibition lesson given by a student-teacher in the pres-
ence of his supervisors and of his fellow students, and criticised later by the group.
The organization of a machinery of supervision thru the routine of which adequate
attention will be given to the work of each student obviously involves the danger
1 Thirty-one women supervisors receive an average salary of $1386, while forty-eight women teachers of academic
subjects receive an average salary of $1353 ; taking men and women together, the supervisor's average salary is $1368,
while the average salary of all academic teachers is $1569.
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING 215
lest routine become an end in itself. It is essential that the system be sufficiently
elastic to prevent its hardening into a mere mechanism, and so thoroughly charged
with meaning that neither supervisor nor student-teacher will ever lose sight of the
purpose of any detail. It is also essential that its routine be so well established as to
leave no chances open for the repetition of serious blunders, or for the continuance
of conditions that are inimical to the welfare of the pupils. Some of the more im-
portant elements in this organization will be briefly noted.
Lesson Plans. The welfare of both teacher and pupils demands a careful planning
of each lesson, and the criticism of each plan by a supervisor before the lesson is pre-
sented. In no other way can the supervisor be assured that the subject-matter of the
lesson has been properly organized, and that the materials which the student- teacher
proposes to present contain no errors. That this requirement has its dangers no one
will deny; as one director of training explained: "We are afraid that the lesson
plan will get in the teacher's way when he goes before his class." Certainly there is
a risk that two important elements in successful teaching — spontaneity and enthu-
siasm — may be impaired by the process. On the other hand, while the danger must
be recognized, there can be no doubt of the necessity for incurring it. The testimony
of good teachers everywhere is to the effect that a painstaking preliminary working
over of materials will not only not destroy one's spontaneity in teaching, but rather,
because of the sense of mastery that results, will free one to do superior work. Confi-
dence that is thus made intelligent breeds a sort of driving power beside which the
enthusiasm springing from one's first uncritical interest is exceedingly superficial. The
skilful supervisor, in watching the work of the young teacher, can quickly detect
whether the life has gone out of it because of too close attention to the prepared
outline, and this is the time for suggestions as to the proper place of the lesson plan.
Whether lesson plans should be required daily or weekly or by terms or by large
topics or in any combination of these units is not so important a matter provided
that some routine of effective preparation is recognized and practised.1 The greatest
care upon the part of the supervisor, however, is essential to prevent the daily plan-
ning from becoming merely perfunctory. Probably the best practice is to provide a
stated period each day when supervisor and teacher may meet for a conference on the
lesson to be taught, and when the teacher may go over with the supervisor each step
in the proposed exercise. While these may take more time than is involved in merely
reading "the lesson plans and returning them with corrections and suggestions, the ex-
penditure is a good investment, for the actual viva voce consideration of the problems
will do more than anything else to prevent them from losing their interest. The time
taken by the conferences may be reduced as the student's skill increases.
Practices and policies regarding lesson planning show considerable variation among
the Missouri normal schools. At Kirksville there is no uniform system; a few of the
1 Lesson planning may well be graded, requiring at the outset daily plans covering small units, and progressing
thru definite stages to the plan that covers a relatively large unit of subject-mattert tlie teaching of which will
occupy several recitation periods.
816 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
supervisors require plans in advance, but most of them, it seems, allow "plans" to
be worked out and presented after the lesson has been taught! As a review by the
student- teacher of what he has attempted to do in each lesson, the latter practice
may have considerable value; as a substitute for preliminary planning, it cannot be
considered satisfactory. Nor did the actual practice teaching observed in Kirksville
justify in any way the failure to establish an effective routine of lesson planning. It
was clear in some cases that the student-teachers did not take their work seriously, —
a condition that the requirement of lesson plans certainly tends to correct; and the
general tone and spirit of the practice school work indicated a looseness of standards
which must go inevitably with lack of system.
At Warrensburg, each student-teacher prepares daily the plan for the next day^s
teaching. This plan is placed in the supervisor's hands before the close of the day,
and is returned on the following day, just before the time at which the lesson is to
be given, unless the student calls for it earlier, as he is privileged to do. This prac-
tice ensures the preparation of a plan by the student, but it does not ensure a confer-
ence with the supervisor, or, indeed, a review of the plan in time to make needed
corrections.
At Cape Girardeau, an effort is made to prevent the lesson planning from becoming
mechanical by discouraging plans of a too formal type. Brief, simple statements of
what the student- teacher proposes to do are required in advance, usually covering
three or four lessons. In the later stages of practice teaching, the requirement as to
plans may be, and, we take it, usually is still further relaxed.
At Springfield, lesson plans are required of each student-teacher, sometimes a week,
sometimes two days, in advance of the day upon which the lesson is to be presented.
At Maryville, daily plans are required in each case, and whenever the student-
teacher is following the problem method, which is heavily emphasized in this school,
an additional plan must be presented covering a unit of work. The plans must be
examined and returned by the supervisor before the teaching hour. Once each week
the superintendent of the training school inspects all plans.
Inspection of Class WorJc, The class work of the student-teacher must be frequently
observed if mistakes are to be nipped in the bud. This again involves a serious danger
lest the teacher become self-conscious, losing thereby both spontaneity and confidence.
It is by his success in counteracting this danger that the wisdom of the supervisor is
best measured; the test of the skilful supervisor is the ability to inspire his charges
with a confidence in his own fairness and sympathy that will make his presence in the
classroom welcomed rather than dreaded. In any case, the need of such visitation is
paramount, and one of the best results of practice teaching upon the student-teacher
is to accustom him from the outset to do his work free from embarrassment in the pres-
ence of other adults. To deal with immature minds in a manner that commands the
admiration of one's equals is the constant distinction of the professional teacher.
Provision should be made for the visitation of each student-teacher at least once
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING 217
every day. The visits need not be always for the full lesson period, altho sitting thru
a lesson forms the best basis for constructive criticism, and should occur at least once
each week, and oftener at the outset of the student's work. Generally speaking, this
intensive supervision is the function of the subject-matter supervisor, who in every
case should be either a member of the corresponding academic department of the
normal school, or in close touch with it. The grade supervisors or critic teachers, the
principal of the training school, and the director of the training department should
share in supervision, assuming responsibility especially for safeguarding the interests
of the pupils; for this purpose the shorter visits will often be sufficient
The general impression of the observers was that the student-teachers in the Mis-
souri normal schools were not visited frequently enough by their supervisors. In the
course of many visits to practice classes it was rarely that a supervisor was either
found in the room or seen to enter during the period of the visit. An exception should
be noted in favor of the primary departments. In practically all of the institutions,
the practice teaching in the lower grades seemed to be much more carefully and
closely supervised than the teaching in the intermediate and upper grades. Particu-
larly commendable in this respect were the primary departments at Kirksville, War-
rensburg, and Maryville. At Springfield, the supervision of all of the grades appeared
much more effective than in any of the other schools.
Conferences. Stated provisions for conferences are important features of a system
of supervision, but these may be overdone also. For improving practice teaching, the
stated but informal conference between the supervisor and the individual student-
teacher should have the greatest emphasis* Next to this in importance is the "general"
conference of the principal or director in which all of the student-teachers and super-
visors are brought together chiefly for the purpose of developing an effective esprit
de corps. Here the needs and policies of the school as a school for children rather than
as a laboratory for teachers should be the centre of attention, and the conference
should become analogous to the "teachers' meetings" held by the capable superin-
tendent of a public school system. The feeling upon the part of each student that he
holds to the practice school the same responsible relationship as he will later hold to
the school in which he serves for pay, often stimulates the kind of effort that makes
for rapid growth; to kindle this feeling of responsibility is a prime function of the
head of the training school, and it is thru the general conference that he may most
directly promote this end. Conferences of this sort should not be held too often, for
they are essentially " inspirational" in character; perhaps once a fortnight is sufficient.
Group conferences of primary teachers, intermediate grade teachers, and upper grade
teachers, and conferences of teachers of English, arithmetic, history, and other sub-
jects are important. In some schools, however, the number of interests demanding
conferences is so large that the student-teachers are overwhelmed with these engage-
ments, and time and energy which they could more profitably give to intensive prepa-
ration for their teaching are exhausted. Certainly a policy that would consider group
218 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
conferences as an acceptable substitute for intensive classroom supervision coupled
with individual conferences would be most unfortunate.
The conferences of supervisors regarding the work of the student- teachers and the
condition of the school as a whole, on the other hand, are of the very greatest impor-
tance. All supervisors who oversee the work of the same teachers should meet together
at least once each week, under the chairmanship of the director, to coordinate the
different agencies of supervision; and meetings of all of the supervisors, constituting
what has been referred to above as the "training-school cabinet," should be held at
least once each fortnight to consider the work of all student-teachers and the general
condition of the school.
The requirements for conferences in the Missouri normal schools are in brief as
follows : At Kirksville, the chief emphasis is laid upon the individual conference, for
which there is apparently no stated time. General conferences, according to the prin-
cipal of the training school, are not held, and group conferences are held only occa-
sionally. At Cape Girardeau, the primary supervisors confer with the student-teachers
two or three times each week. These conferences are chiefly individual, altho an occa-
sional group conference is held. The superintendent of the training school holds a
general conference with the student-teachers once a week; the supervisors generally
attend this conference; the discussions are commonly confined to school management
and organization, and to the phases of teaching that affect particularly the "personal
equation." During the first part of the year the superintendent meets all of the super-
visors each week in conference.
The conferences at Springfield seem to be much more elaborately organized. Each
supervisor meets almost daily with each student-teacher under his supervision, and at
least once each week he also meets his group. A general conference is held every fort-
night. At each of the group conferences a member of the cognate academic depart-
ment is commonly present; at the general conference it is customary to have some
one not connected with the school address the student- teachers. There are no stated
and regular meetings of the supervisory staff, but the superintendent confers daily
with the various supervisors as individuals.
At Maryville, also, the conference plays an important part in the supervision of
practice teaching. Each day the supervisors have two individual conferences with the
student-teachers, one before the lesson for the criticism of plans, and one after the
lesson for a discussion of the actual work done. The director of the training depart-
ment meets all of the student-teachers four times each week. Regular assignments
for reading are made, and recitations and examinations are demanded. Class man-
agement, the technique of teaching, discipline, the administration of the small school,
the state course of study, and similar topics were parts of the program of this gen-
eral conference during the term when the school was visited. This practice goes far
beyond the ground proposed in the preceding pages for the general conference, and
really becomes equivalent to the course in the technique of teaching and manage-
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING 219
ment that was proposed in an earlier section.1 In addition to these four weekly con-
ferences, the principal of the school meets all of the student-teachers and supervisors
once each week in a teachers' meeting at which the general policies of the school are
discussed.
Testing Results. The supervision of teaching — whether practice teaching or "reg-
ular" teaching — cannot proceed effectively unless an intelligent effort is made to
check the results of the teacher's work as measured by the growth of pupils. It is in
terms of such growth that the outcomes of teaching must ultimately be evaluated,
and the young teacher should be accustomed from the outset to think of his work
as measured finally by this standard. The teacher, like the novice in other arts, grows
most rapidly under the stimulus of responsibility, and the responsibility for securing
definite results cannot be impressed too early or reiterated too often.
The efforts to improve practice teaching, then, are not to be limited to the criti-
cisms and suggestions which the supervisor makes to the student after his visits to
the practice class. Indispensable as they are, these cannot tell the whole story. They
are concerned primarily with immediate classroom happenings, — with discipline,
questioning, illustration, the stimulation of thought, the accuracy of the information
imparted, and the like. All of these are means to an end, and the end, obviously, is the
pupil's growth. An exclusive emphasis upon the means will tend to prevent a proper
perspective upon the problem as a whole, — will tend to exaggerate means into a simu-
lacrum of ends. In all effective supervision of teaching, therefore, the efforts of the
supervisor must be supplemented by objective tests that will determine the growth
that the pupils have made under the teacher's direction.
Program of Studies. Teaching cannot be tested or evaluated in terms of the pupil's
growth unless the direction and nature of the desired growth have been previously
determined. There must be a definite program of attainments, so to speak, which
shall be both a guide to a teacher's efforts and a standard against which to measure
his achievements. This program of attainments is usually called a "course of study;"
but since a well-articulated program is commonly made up of coordinated courses
of study, it may be better designated as a "curriculum." Whatever it may be called,
this program is an indispensable part of every school, and the practice school is no
exception.
Two questions arise as to the program of studies in a practice school: (1) Who
should be responsible for its construction? and (2) How closely should it resemble
the programs usually found in the schools in which the graduates of the normal
school may be expected to teach? One's answer to either of these questions will de-
pend largely upon the attitude that one takes toward a much more fundamental ques-
tion of policy in the organization and administration of institutions for the prepa-
ration of teachers, namely, In how far should such institutions assume the responsi-
bility for initiating and promoting departures from existing educational practices?
1 See page 190.'
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
The significance of this fundamental question may be made clearer by reference to
two types of teacher-training schools, each of which is represented among the Missouri
institutions. The program of studies in the Wyman School of Harris Teachers College
is determined in no way by the college itself. It is the standard and uniform "city
course of study,55 adopted by the board of education upon the recommendation of the
superintendent. The program of studies that guides the cadets in their apprentice
work is this same course of study. In sharp contrast with the Harris Teachers College
in this respect stands the elementary school of the University of Missouri, which is
frankly an experimental school, altho used to some extent for both observation and
practice. The course of study at this school represents a practical attempt to trans-
form the whole system of elementary schooling, and is as unlike that of the average
elementary school as could well be conceived.
The state normal schools, generally speaking, fall between these two extremes.
Springfield more closely resembles the Harris Teachers College in that the first eight
grades of the training school follow the state course of study, and consequently em-
body the type of elementary school work which the graduate of the normal school
will do when he enters actual service. The policy at Kirksville, on the other hand,
more closely resembles that of the university elementary school, in that little or no
emphasis seems to be placed on the coordination of the practice school program either
with the state course of study or with the elementary programs found in the neigh-
boring district. Indeed, at the time of the visits made to Kirksville, the practice school
was without a printed "course of study," and there was no evidence even of a sylla-
bus in manuscript. Each supervisor, it seems, prepared his own course. At Cape Gir-
ardeau no use is made of the state course of study, but»a fairly typical elementary
program is published in the annual catalogue, and the statement of the aims of the
training school includes the following: " To conduct an elementary and high school
according to the principles known to be sound through the experience and research of
leading educators." This seems to indicate that the school is not intended to be ex-
perimental in its purposes, altho the superintendent stated to one of the visitors that
the course of study in the training school is "always in the making." At Maryville,
the state course of study is not used. The program for the training school had Jbeen
prepared apparently by the training-school staff, and represented radical departures
from the elementary programs in common use in the district.
SHOULD THE PRACTICE SCHOOL EXPERIMENT WITH THE CURRICULUM?
From tibe point of view of the initial efficiency of the normal school graduate when
tie enters actual service, the policy which fits the training-school program of studies
as closely as possible to that of the public schools is clearly to be preferred. From the
point of view of promoting educational progress, it is equally clear that this policy may
have an unfortunate tendency to perpetuate the status quo. The question, therefore,
as to the responsibility of the normal schools for the improvement of the program
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING
of studies in elementary schools in addition to imparting skill to prospective teachers
in these schools becomes one of fundamental significance.
The question is a perplexing one. From all that can be observed, it is safe to say
that the leadership of the normal schools in effecting marked changes in the elemen-
tary program of studies has been practically negligible except in one or two notable
instances. Many practice schools have made radical departures that apparently have
had not the slightest influence upon the public schools to which they have sent their
graduates as teachers. A plausible explanation of this condition lies in the fact that
the tenure of the average elementary teacher, even if he be a normal school graduate,
is so brief that the curriculum policies represented by the training departments have
little opportunity to find lodgment in the public schools; programs of study in towns
and cities are not usually revised at the instance of young and inexperienced teachers.
These facts constitute an argument against the assumption by the normal school of
responsibility for this phase of educational progress, especially when, as seems to be
the case, it is inconsistent with ensuring the highest possible efficiency of its gradu-
ates in the local schools. Again, it cannot.be denied that many instances of "progres-
sive" policies in constructing training-school curricula are based either upon an un-
reflecting acceptance of spectacular proposals, or upon a superficial acquaintance with
really desirable reform programs resulting in their misinterpretation and distortion.
In either case, the practice school becomes in effect a "freak5"1 school, the vagaries of
which are the laughing-stock of competent superintendents, who may, nevertheless,
be willing to take the more capable graduates with the expectation that they can
readily be readjusted to another system.
Many of these difficulties will, of course, be overcome and the underlying evils cor-
rected with the stabilizing of educational theory. But even under better conditions,
it would seem inadvisable for the normal school to attempt* thru its practice school,
both to train teachers how to teach and to demonstrate to the public schools inno-
vations in the subject-matter of instruction. For experimentation in education and
for the demonstration of every well-matured proposal, there should be abundant op-
portunity, and normal schools that are adequately supported should be encouraged to
assume an important leadership in that type of educational progress which is repre-
sented by curriculum reform. But this phase of their work should not be confused
with their primary duty of training inexperienced practitioners. A normal school
may well have its experimental school with its staff of trained experimenters; but
the practice school should not be an experimental school, in part because the decision
regarding the value or worthlessness of this or that innovation should not depend
upon what student-teachers can do with it, and in part because the student-teacher
can be made most efficient for Ms proximate duties when he deals with the same kind
of materials that he is likely to deal with in his actual teaching service. The prac-
tice school, in short, in so far as its curriculum is concerned, should represent the
best approved conditions. This does not mean that it should limit itself to the stand-
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
ards of the median or average public school of its district; it means rather that it
should not reflect a type of educational material that the graduates in all probability
will never be called upon to teach, and readjustments from which in their first teach-
ing will inevitably cause confusion and inefficiency. This, of course, should not pre-
clude an open-minded attitude upon the part of student- teachers toward new depar-
tures; certainly it should not exclude the trial by them of various methods of teach-
ing; " experimentation * of the latter sort should be encouraged. There is, of course,
a vast difference between testing various methods of presenting subject-matter and
attempting to test widely varying types of such material.
For a state normal school like Springfield to use in its training school the state
course of study is a most excellent policy. In some states, however, the central depart-
ments of education do not publish official syllabi for the elementary schools, and in
other states the published outlines are adapted particularly to rural school conditions.
Often a curriculum must be constructed independently, and even when an outline pre-
pared by an outside authority is used, it will probably be well to modify it to some
extent to meet the legitimately peculiar needs of a practice school Some authority
in the normal school, therefore, should be responsible for the training-school curricu-
lum, and this responsibility may best be lodged in the training-school cabinet, com-
posed, as has been suggested, of the critic teachers and supervisors including repre-
sentatives of academic departments, acting under the chairmanship of the director of
training.
(h) CONCENTRATED versus DISTRIBUTED PRACTICE TEACHING
In a majority of the state normal schools of the United States, the work in practice
teaching is "distributed" in the sense that the student teaches for one period each day,
carrying other normal school courses at the same time, all of the work, including the
practice teaching, usually constituting a full program. In other words, the student's
energies during the period of practice teaching are distributed among a number of
stated engagements and activities of which the actual work in teaching is only one.
In a respectable minority of schools the practice teaching is "concentrated" in the
sense that, during the term, semester, or year devoted to this work, it constitutes the
sole or at least the chief business of the student.
There are advantages and disadvantages in each type of organization. Other things
being equal, the "distributed" practice teaching permits the extension of practice
over a longer period of time, an arrangement that is thought to be favorable in view
of the fact that in the acquisition of skill a wide distribution of learning periods
generally brings better results than their concentration. This has been experimentally
demonstrated for certain types of skill, and authorities in educational psychology have
not hesitated to generalize these particular instances into a principle that is favor-
able to distributed learning in all fields where skill is the desired outcome. It is hardly
likely, however, that the psychology of learning has been a potent factor in the es-
PROFESSIONAL COURSES : PRACTICE TEACHING
tablishment of the system of distributed practice; the major reason for its endorse-
ment has been its administrative convenience. Distributed practice permits the stu-
dent's programs to be arranged with the course in practice teaching upon the same
basis as the other normal school courses; and when a considerable proportion of the
teaching in the training school must be done by student-teachers, the system gives
a better opportunity to ensure a sufficient number of teachers at all times during the
year. Moreover, for similar reasons, an elective system, with its emphasis on academic
subjects in preparation for the university or out of consideration for men students,
finds the distributed system preferable to one that places practice in the high light
of a full term's concentrated attention.
On the other hand, distributed practice involves a very serious danger either that
the preparation for the daily teaching will be neglected because of the claims of other
courses, or that the legitimate demands of other courses will be neglected because of
the pressure to do good work in teaching; as thus administered, practice is but one of
four or more not necessarily related obligations, whereas it should be the focus of all
the candidate's earlier preparation and the absorbing centre of all his present in-
terests. In short, the theoretical advantages of distributed learning may, in the case
of practice teaching, be more than offset by the obvious disadvantages of divided
attention. Skill should certainly be one of the results of the work in practice teach-
ing, but it is not the only outcome desired; insight into child nature, mastery of
subject-matter taught, sensitiveness to unhygienic conditions and to symptoms of dis-
order— all of these and many other factors are sought in addition to specific habits.
The performance for an hour each day of a single, isolated unit of classroom work is
qualitatively a totally different experience from that involved in concentrating one's
full energy and attention on the life of a class for a whole day or a half day, and
having every additional exercise planned with a view to the illumination of that one
intensive study. It cannot be doubted that many students who now slip thru with
a fair average for all subjects by the distributed plan, would fail ignominionsly if
required, as they should be, to stake everything on their performance in this search-
ing and selective test*
In mastering telegraphy, typewriting, and the other arts from which the experi-
mental conclusions concerning the value of distributed learning have been mainly
derived, it is the habit side which is important; one practising typewriting does not
have to prepare laboriously for each practice period, and the factor of distraction
thru the pressure of other duties scarcely affects the development of desirable habits
as it does in teaching; nor does the practice of typewriting involve anything akin to
the mastery of subject-matter and the understanding of child nature that teaching
involves. In teaching children, a habit that is of any value must be accompanied by
insights that may be had only by saturation, as it were, in the experience itself when
directed and explained by those to whom such insights are real. Perhaps the chief
indictment of the system of distributed practice is its effect upon the pupils of the
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
practice classes. Their interests alone would seem to demand that the work of teach-
ing be the primary interest of the student-teacher to the ends (1) that he may make
the best possible preparation for each day's work, and (2) that the distraction of the
practice classes thru the frequent changes of teachers during the day be reduced to
a minimum.
Among the Missouri institutions., the concentrated system of practice teaching
finds a place only in the Harris Teachers College, where, as has been pointed out, the
student spends his third half year as an apprentice in an elementary school, giving
all of his time and energy to this work. The practice teaching in the state normal
schools is everywhere upon the distributed basis,1 and this is doubtless one expla-
nation of the generally unsatisfactory character of the practice teaching in most of
them.
(i) MOST FAVORABLE POSITION OF PRACTICE TEACHING IN THE CURRICULUM
Practice teaching is usually placed in the last year, semester, or term of the stu-
dent's residence at the normal school. In St. Louis, as has been pointed out, the third
semester of the two-year curriculum is given over to apprentice teaching, leaving the
fourth semester for the courses in history and theory of education. This plan, while
most commendable from the point of view of accepted educational principles, is quite
unusual in normal schools and city training schools. Those in charge of the work are
naturally reluctant to commit the pupils of the training school to the care of student-
teachers before the latter have had the advantage of all of the academic and profes-
sional instruction that it is possible to give. With the development of three-year and
four-year curricula it would be thoroughly practicable to arrange the courses in such
a way that a final term or semester could be devoted to a type of work designed to
summarize and interpret the results of the preceding courses in the light of fun-
damental principles. The large advantage of this arrangement lies in the fact that
the student's work is rounded out; he is left with a body of theory that aims to or-
ganize and systematize the details that have gone before, and also to provide a back-
ground for later growth.
It would be a mistake, however, to limit the student's active contact with the train-
ing school to the period of his responsible practice teaching. As soon as possible after
his residence at the normal school begins, he should be introduced to the actual prob-
lems of teaching, partly, as we have suggested, thru systematic observation closely
correlated with subject-matter courses, and even more intimately thru the type of
training-school work that has been called "participation." This may sometimes in-
1 The following excerpt from one of the many reports from normal school teachers gives a clear picture of the sit-
uation from within:
"Concentrated practice teaching was the theory in the school here to some extent even when yon were making
the survey; it had fuller sweep a year or two earlier. It was administratively impossible with the wide elective
privileges accorded to students. Further, adequate supervision could not be provided with the funds available,
and many of the candidates for diplomas were hardly capable of making adequate preparation for an entire day
of teaching work. Scattered through a rather wide list of electives their failures were less apparent, tho doubtless
not less real.'*
COURSES IN SPECIFIC METHODS
elude, as in the plan developed at the University of Wisconsin, taking a place as a
pupil in one of the classes, preparing the lessons, and being ready at any time either
to " recite" as a pupil or to exchange places with the regular teacher. Participation
of this sort will generally be limited to the more advanced training-school classes.
Besides this, there should be a period of active service as a helper or assistant to the
regular teacher, especially in matters concerning class routine, coaching individual
pupils, preparing materials, accompanying classes upon excursions, and arranging for
dramatic festivals, together with some measure of responsible oversight of recess and
play periods in connection with active participation in the smaller children's plays
and games, or in the older pupils' athletic contests.
The aim of this active participation in the work of the training school would be
twofold: first, to keep the student from the outset in the closest possible touch with
the problems that he will have later to face as a teacher; and, secondly, to prepare
him gradually for the more exacting responsibilities of the practice class.
Work of this sort has not been highly organized in any of the normal schools or
city training schools of Missouri, nor indeed is it at all common in the normal schools
of the country at large. Its value is so obvious, nevertheless, and the results of intro-
ducing it wherever it has been carefully organized have been so favorable, that the
general plan may be heartily commended. The most serious difficulties in the way of
such procedure are to be found in the meagre laboratory equipment of most of the
normal schools. This is an additional reason for insisting that every normal school
should have under its control a sufficient number of the local public schools to en-
sure adequate facilities for all varieties of practical work.
c. COLLEGIATE COURSES IN SPECIFIC METHODS OF TEACHING
The term "special methods" has been used in American normal schools by way of
contrast with "general method" to designate courses that deal either with the actual
technique of presenting different subjects, or with the specialized problems involved
in teaching pupils at different levels of advancement. Thus we find, on the one hand,
methods courses in arithmetic, grammar, geography, English, and similar subjects,
and, on the other hand, courses in primary methods, intermediate grade methods,
high school methods, and the like. Not infrequently the specialization has reference
both to tibe subject-matter and to the level upon which it is to be taught; for exam-
ple, methods of teaching reading in the primary grades, or methods of teaching his-
tory in the high school. In some schools, too, a distinction is made between "methods'1
courses and "courses in the teaching of1" this or that subject, the former term refer-
ring to elementary school subjects, the latter to high school subjects.
In theory these courses in specific methods of teaching are usually conceived as
involving an explicit application of the principles developed in the more general
courses, particularly psychology, "general method," and the principles of teaching, —
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
an expression of the same belief in the validity of a strictly deductive procedure that
has hitherto characterized in general the construction of curricula for the prepara-
tion of teachers. In practice, however, the "special methods" courses have tended to be
quite empirical. Sometimes they are simply subject-matter reviews, with a few sug-
gestions from the instructor as to approved or disapproved methods of presenting this
or that topic to elementary classes;1 sometimes they touch but lightly the content
of the subject, and lay their chief emphasis upon the principles of classroom technique,
especially in connection with such problems as the recitation, questioning, teaching
pupils how to study, and the like;2 and still another type of course treats not only the
actual teaching of the subject, but also its historical development and its place in the
general scheme of education.3
The normal school graduates who were asked to rate the professional courses of
the normal school in the order of their value in teaching placed the courses in spe-
cial methods first of all, and university graduates gave special methods courses the
same preference.4 In view of the variations in these courses, it is impossible to de-
termine from the replies to the questionnaire just what type of work in the study of
specific methods of teaching is of most worth, but one may hazard the opinion that
the courses that emphasize careful study of the subject-matter to be taught and the
best methods of presenting it to elementary pupils are those that have the largest
practical value. This would be particularly true where the normal schools have failed
to provide courses in these subjects in their advanced curricula, for in such cases ac-
quaintance with the actual content of one's future teaching is limited to these courses
in special methods.
1 The following outline, for example, was submitted for a course (of collegiate grade) in the teaching of English in
elementary schools: Themes, 10 in all: Description, 2; Narration, 2; Exposition, 4; Argumentation, 2. Prepared
recitations: Description; Exposition; Argumentation; Diction: Unequivocalness, Precision, Familiarity, Logical
conformity. Functionality, Idiomatic usage, Repetition, Tone, Vigor, Beauty.
2 While there are in the normal schools a few instances of special methods courses that overlap the general courses
in school management and the technique of teaching, the most pronounced instance was found in one of the teach-
ers' courses in the University of Missouri where, among other topics, the-followmg were given a large emphasis:
1. The importance of well-organized classroom work. 2. The recitation, its character and aim; problem viewpoint.
3. The study of the new lesson and its importance; teaching. 4. The assignments; home work and school work;
reading. 5. Attention, interest, and good order in the class. 6. Special problems connected with classroom work.
On the day when the class was visited, the instructor spent most of the hour in dictating directions for students'
observation of high school work. Twenty-three specific rules for observation were stated, no one of which had espe-
cial reference to the teaching of the subject, but all of which were concerned with general problems of classroom
technique.
In a class on the teaching of history in one of the normal schools, the instructor's lecture followed the subjoined
outline: 1. Supervised study. 2. Home study: (a) Have a regular place for study. (6) Have a regular time for study,
(c) Use the will power In holding the mind and hand to the lesson. 3. Rules for getting a lesson. (Six rules were
dictated, no one of which had especial reference to history.) 4. What to do in supervised study. (Five suggestions
were dictated, one of which had a direct reference to history.) 5. Test of supervised study in history.
3 A good example of a course of this type is furnished by the following outline (a twelve weeks course in special
methods in history, offered in one of the normal schools): 1. Aim of history. 2. Historical material. 3. History in
German, French, English, and American schools. 4. The teacher's qualifications. 5. The organization of facts. 6. Meth-
ods of teaching. 7. The course of study. 8. Observation lessons in all of the grades given from time to time as needed
in the course of the work under Topic 7. 9. Several lessons on the teaching of civics as presented by Bourne, the
Committee of Eight, Hinsdale, Hill, and the Committee on Social Studies of the Commission on the Reorganization
of Secondary Education. 10. Special reports.
* See page 442.
COURSES IN SPECIFIC METHODS
GOOD SPECIAL METHOD A FUNCTION OF SUBJECT-MATTER COURSES
If the position taken in the preceding sections of this report is valid, the normal
schools of Missouri should give a much larger place than they do at present, not to
detached courses in "special methods," but rather to subject-matter courses that will
deal in a thorough manner with the materials that the normal school students will
later teach. A comprehensive course in arithmetic, or in upper grade literature, or in
intermediate grade geography — a course adapted to the capacities and attainments
of collegiate students — should furnish, from the point of view both of subject-mat-
ter and of method, an adequate, if not an ideal, equipment for teaching the subject.
According to this plan, subject-matter courses when thus thoroughly "professional-
ized," may well constitute the basis of each curriculum for the preparation of teachers,
and the illogical abstraction of "method*" from the subject-matter to which it per-
tains may in this way be largely eliminated. This does not mean that subject-mat-
ter courses should be limited to the materials that will appear in the later teaching-
programs of the student, but the first care should be that such materials are amply
provided for. If curricula are specialized as was suggested in an earlier section,1 the
subject-matter can be covered very minutely and yet with fulness; and interpreta-
tions can be added that will ensure courses of exceptional value to the teacher.
"CURRICULUM" COURSES
There is one type of " special methods" course, however, for which there will still
remain a place. While " methods in arithmetic," "methods in grammar," "methods
in geography," and similar titles should in time disappear from the catalogues of the
normal school, replaced largely by "arithmetic," "grammar," "geography," and so
forth, there should be courses that will definitely aim to coordinate all of the mate-
rials proposed for each specialized field. In most normal schools one now finds courses
in "primary methods," and occasionally courses in "intermediate grade methods,"
" junior high school methods," " methods of high school teaching," and " rural school
methods," each intended to unify in some measure the different types of work at-
tempted on these various levels. Such courses represent the nearest approach to " special
methods" courses that would be needed if the entire curriculum were professionalized.
With subject-matter courses organized as their appropriate method of exposition re-
quires, these other courses would become essentially studies in the adaptation and
sequence of this properly organized subject-matter to a particular age or condition
of childhood — curriculum courses, as it were, within the individual subjects them-
selves. Under the plan of differentiation proposed in an earlier section, l each of these
curriculum courses would be in one sense the central course, the keystone, of a specific
curriculum.
1 See pages 148 ff.
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
d COURSES IN ACADEMIC SUBJECTS
The normal schools of Missouri were designated in an earlier section as of the
"academic" type. From whatever point of view they are examined, one cannot fail to
be impressed by the very slight difference in apparent aim between the work done
in the normal schools and the work done in non-professional schools and colleges of
similar grade. This policy is commonly justified on the ground that these academic
subjects, while apparently the same, are taught in a way that differentiates them from
corresponding courses in institutions of general education by revealing clearly their
intimate relationships to the more elementary subject-matter and to the problems of
teaching in the lower schools. The present section will examine very briefly the valid-
ity of this argument, especially in so far as it rests upon the assumption that the aca-
demic courses are clearly differentiated upon a professional basis.
(I) ENGLISH AND PUBLIC SPEAKING
The most striking feature of the normal schools' offerings in English1 is their
number and variety. In three of the schools, the English courses alone could engage
a student's entire time for more than two years. Indeed, if we include the few sec-
ondary courses, they actually contemplate a larger amount of work in this subject
than is offered by the University of Missouri.2
AMOUNT AND VARIETY EXCESSIVE FOB SOUND CURRICULA
One may infer from the list of courses that collegiate work in English is designed
primarily to prepare high school teachers of this subject. But it is reasonable to ask
whether this professional objective could not be attained much more effectively by
making specific curriculum requirements.3 No prospective teacher of English can take
all of the courses offered in any one of the three schools even during a three-year
or four-year attendance. It would seem both feasible and economical, therefore, to
reach an agreement as to what a teacher of English most needs in the way of academic
equipment in the subject rather than to overburden the program with elective courses,
some of which are certainly of less value than others for the purpose in view. The
limitations of the teaching staff would also dictate a restriction of the offerings* The
"load" upon the four or five instructors in the English department of each of the
normal schools is much heavier than appears, for some of the courses are necessarily
repeated two, three, or even four times each year.
If any advantage inheres in the policy of preparing high school teachers in the
normal schools, this advantage can be best expressed in the provision of real cur-
ricula directed toward definite teaching-objectives. The colleges and the universities
1 See page 406.
2 The total annual offerings of the English department in the University of Missouri aggregate ninety-one semester
hours. This includes, as in the normal schools, the courses in public speaking.
8 Variety might be justified by many different curricula were not students with widely varying objectives regis-
tered for the same courses.
ACADEMIC COURSES : ENGLISH
do not supply such curricula. The universities, particularly,, find the elective system
administratively expedient largely because selections can be made from the various
offerings to meet more or less satisfactorily any one of a number of objectives. The
English department, for example, must teach English to the prospective lawyer^ the
prospective journalist, the prospective engineer, and the prospective physician (to
name but a few of the vocations that its students will enter) as well as to prospec-
tive teachers. From the point of view of educational efficiency, it could do each job
better if courses could be organized that would be specifically directed toward each
calling, but this is not generally feasible in such institutions.1 The situation in the
normal school is quite different. It is preparing for one profession, or at most for
related subdivisions of one profession. It has the strategic advantage of being able
to concentrate upon its problem or upon its limited number of related problems. In
Missouri, the normal schools have not risen to this opportunity. Tho avowedly under-
taking to prepare high school teachers, these schools are satisfied to imitate the prac-
tices and policies of the colleges and universities, — practices and policies that, in
so far as the training of high school teachers is concerned, certainly constitute a mis-
guided leadership.
PROFESSIONAL CHARACTER NEGLIGIBLE
The contention that these academic courses are appreciably modified in the normal
schools to meet a professional need is not borne out by the best available testimony, —
the testimony, namely, of the instructors themselves. On the question blanks sub-
mitted to the instructors in the normal schools in connection with the present study,
this request appeared:
"Point out definitely the nature and extent of the pedagogical element in the
course; that is, just what and how much you do in the course that you would not
do if the students were not intending to teach. State, if possible, the relative
proportion of time devoted to pedagogical as compared with academic work."
In a small minority of reports there are suggestions of differentiations with refer-
ence to the professional purpose. A very few of these are definite and indicate that
the instructor has deliberately organized his work with the needs of prospective teach-
ers in view. For example:
"Considerable attention is given informally to the problems of teaching read-
ing and elementary public speaking in rural schools and the grades. The entire
method of the class is planned for helpfulness in teaching similar work to more
elementary students." (Course in Oral English and American Literature.)
The following replies, however, are typical of the attitude of three-fourths of the
teachers of English and American literature:
"The course is chiefly academic. Possibly more attention is given to the selection
1 Altho in some universities, the engineering colleges have insisted on specialized courses for their students in such
subjects as English and mathematics.
230 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
and grouping of material than would be given ordinarily. In other respects it
does not differ in method from the courses usually planned for students who
have no intention of teaching." (Course on American Poets.)
"I should probably do the same kind of work, the ability of the students being
the same, were I teaching in any other kind of an institution." (Course in Shake-
speare.)
"To cover the ground, the course must be mainly academic. Time is lacking for
more than minor mention of the methods and suitableness of teaching and sub-
ject-matter respectively. But there is a required course taken by these students,
the teaching of literature, that covers the pedagogical side of the question."
(Course in American Literature.)
" Pedagogy in this course is incidental — only so far as proper methods are
employed by the teacher is pedagogy exemplified with occasional reference to
why a certain method of development was employed and wherein further ampli-
fication would be necessary with younger pupils." (Course in Literature offered to
candidates for Rural Certificate.)
"Only incidental work of a pedagogical nature." (Course in English Drama.)
"No special pedagogical work. The aim is to present a method of literary study
and a knowledge of the period covered." (Course in Wordsworth.)
"The only direct pedagogical element is the discussion of suitable modern liter-
ature to introduce into the school course, the library, etc." (Course in Recent and
Contemporary Literature.)
"The course is almost entirely academic. Of course, the feeling that most of
the class will be teachers modifies the nature of the instruction to some extent."
(Course in English Literature.)
The reports from teachers of composition and rhetoric are of the same negative
tenor, — "Course entirely academic;" "Pedagogical element incidental;" and so
forth. But again, in a small minority of the cases, one comes across suggestions of
a definite sort, as the following:
" I seek to secure the habit of ascertaining the cause of all errors and the reason
of all effectiveness in composition or speech. I seek also to emphasize funda-
mental principles in terms so simple and clear that they can readily be trans-
ferred to very elementary composition instruction."
An opinion that is probably more general among teachers of academic subjects
than the statements in their replies indicate is frankly expressed by an instructor
in English composition; the italics are ours :
"/ can hardly be so foolish as to spend apart of my time giving the training and
part showing- how to give it to others. I expect that the students who expect to
teach composition will make careful note of the methods and practices of this
course. I do give the students considerable training in grading each others'
themes, but that ought to be done in any theme course, and is done in most
university courses in composition."
ACADEMIC COURSES : ENGLISH 231
How SHOULD CONTENT COURSES BE PROFESSIONALIZED?
There is, undoubtedly, a firm conviction on the part of many teachers that sub-
ject-matter and methods must be separated, the latter following the former in every
case. According to this point of view, an attempt to do the two things at once is to
incur the risk of divided attention with the probability that neither will be done well.
This is, of course, a danger to be avoided. It is probable, however, that those who
take this view have an exaggerated idea of what "method" is. Mastery of method in
a given material is after all little more than a clear consciousness of the way in which
the material shapes itself most advantageously to the learner. There should be, there-
fore, no question of teaching subject-matter and methods simultaneously as diverse
objects of attention; it is rather a matter of utilizing the actual experience of the
student in learning in order to throw light upon his later problem of teaching. Cer-
tain pedagogical problems may well be relegated to methods courses, — or preferably
to what were referred to in the preceding section as " curriculum" courses, — but the
large problem of organizing the subject-matter for teaching and of indicating the
points at which the teacher's emphasis must fall can in general be solved nowhere
so well as in the subject-matter course itself. Whether it be a "review" or a "new
view," the student's experiences in learning or relearning will form the best concrete
basis for an understanding of the special "pedagogy" of the subject. While these
experiences are fresh, they should be studied and discussed to the end that they may
be registered in the student's mind and be subject to recall when he himself essays
the teacher's task. Thus his whole education sensitizes him to the learning process; it
is not too much to say that the skilful teacher is one who can recall most clearly the
successive steps of his own mastery and thru these reconstruct in imagination the
situation which the pupil is facing. The teacher who cannot do this is the teacher who
is likely to leave out essential stages in instruction and then to charge up his fail-
ure against the stupidity of his pupils. It is just this power of recall and of self-
analysis in fresh learning that explains the humility and sympathy of the learning
teacher as contrasted with the mental snobbery of the teacher who does not insist
that he himself from time to time attack strange and difficult material To be sure,
his own experiences with subjects that cause his students difficulties gradually fade
unless thoroughly studied and rationalized at the time, but the all-essential attitude
of the learner must be maintained if he would really teach.
The instructors in reading and public speaking seem to detect and use the oppor-
tunities for this type of training much more frequently than do the teachers of com-
position and literature. We find, for example, these interesting illustrations in their
replies:
"Students are called on for comment and criticism of the work of others.
The standards of criticism are discussed. The psychological foundation of oral
interpretation is discussed and illustrations given by the teacher. This is applied
in the later work of the class: when an error is made, some member of the class
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
is given the opportunity to try to get the right interpretation; — by means of
question and suggestion giving the right mental stimulus to the reader. About
one-fourth of the term is given definitely to the pedagogical element in the
work. More pedagogical work is done incidentally; that is, attention is called
to method pursued in obtaining a certain interpretation; this is done in pass-
ing." (Course in Expression.)
"Questions for debate are chosen to meet the needs of high school teachers. How
to organize societies in debate, how to judge results, how to criticise — all are
discussed."5* (Course in Debating.)
"All the burden of criticism is thrown upon the members of the class as soon
as adequate standards of criticism can be set up. By this means the students are
taughttomake discriminatingbut tactful judgments about reading and speaking.
"The material for reading in the projects which each is required to under-
take, is taken from those bits of school literature which have been or are likely
to prove difficult to handle.
"The reasons for successful and unsuccessful attempts in reading and speak-
ing in the public schools are probed in great detail.
"The class is notified early in the course that any move made by the in-
structor in the conduct of the recitation or in the arrangement of the material
will be cheerfully explained on request.
"About one-fourth of my time in class is spent upon the strictly pedagogical
aspects of the subject."" (Course in Elementary Reading and Speaking.)
The fact that the courses in public speaking have been so clearly and definitely
adapted to the professional purpose of the normal schools in comparison with the
courses in rhetoric, composition, and literature is perhaps to be explained by their
relatively recent development as collegiate subjects. Their adjustment to specific pur-
poses is not so likely to be impeded by the traditions that naturally cluster about &
subject that has been organized and taught for a relatively long time. in the field
of " general n education.1
(£) ANTCIENX LANGUAGES
Courses in the ancient languages, and especially in Latin, form a substantial pro-
portion of the total offerings at each of the normal schools, altho the actual enrolment
of collegiate students in these courses is so small as to be almost negligible.2 Cape
Girardeau provides ninety-one and one-third semester hours of Latin and Greek and
three secondary units of Latin — certainly an ambitious program for the single in-
structor assigned to this work. These are approximately equal to the offerings in
Latin and Greek at the University of Missouri, where a teaching staff equivalent to
at least four full-time instructors is provided.
It is clear that very few of these courses actually are or can be given during any
1 This is not to say that these "academic " traditions are always to be deplored. In curricula of the general or lib-
eral type, the plan of organization which is based upon the organic development of a body of knowledge will doubt-
less furnish the best pattern for the organization of the teaching. The danger lest the work become detached and
formal may be corrected by the present tendency, even in these general courses, to employ the "problem " method.
2 See page 406.
ACADEMIC COURSES : ANCIENT LANGUAGES 233
one year, and yet nothing appears in the catalogue to indicate this fact, — a policy
of catalogue construction that is the legitimate, or perhaps illegitimate, child of
the elective system. It is the custom at certain universities to announce in advance
courses that constitute an organic sequence thru several years. The normal schools
have no such excuse ; the courses have no reference to work actually under way, and
are apparently published for the sake of appearances only.1
Another interesting fact is revealed by a comparative examination of the offer-
ings of the schools. Out of twenty-six different collegiate courses in Latin offered
by the five normal schools, only three (Cicero, Vergil, and the teachers' course) are
found in all of the schools. Twelve different courses, aggregating more than fifty-
five semester hours of credit, are found only once in the list, and seventeen different
courses, aggregating eighty-six semester hours of credit, are found in fewer than
three of the schools. The conclusion seems justified that, even in so old and well-
standardized a subject as Latin, there is considerable difference of opinion as to what
the qualifications of the secondary teacher should be. It is scarcely possible that all
of the courses finding a place upon this list are of equal value in the preparation
of students who are planning to teach Latin in the high schools.
Upon the part of the instructors in the classical languages a spirit of genuine de-
votion to the cause of Latin education was noted in each of the schools. This is due
in part, of course, to the necessity that the classicists have faced of defending their
studies against criticism. The following extract from the outline of one of the in-
structors is typical of the attitude :
"It is a part of this course to show that Latin has its place in Education.
To show the student that Latin trains along the lines of observing:, reasoning,
recording and expressing. So much stress is placed upon this that it is hoped the
student will carry away an attitude which will tend to make him use this subject
as a medium for the advancement of the essentials named.*7
But this keen enthusiasm for education in Latin upon the part of the instructors
is not peculiar to the normal schools, nor are its expressions here essentially different
from what one hears in the classical departments of the liberal colleges and univer-
sities. Whatever may be the ultimate solution of the Latin problem, the normal
schools that prepare high school teachers have a unique opportunity which cannot
be adequately met merely by reiterating the traditional affirmations of the value
of classical study. The only way in which Latin can escape the stigma of a "dead"
language is for it to show life. This is fundamentally a teaching problem, and it is
here that the normal schools have their golden opportunity. There are exceEent Latin
1 In one of the schools visited in the spring of 1915, twenty-seven collegiate courses in ancient languages were listed
in the catalogue, and by a curious coincidence just twenty-seven students of collegiate grade were enrolled m the
department When the instructor was asked why so many courses were offered, he replied ; 'The Board gauges
a man by the class enrolments ; hence instructors offer a large number of courses." By another curious coincidence,
this instructor during the term in question taugh t twenty-seven hours each week. In the following year, the aver-
asses in the classics was approximately twenty-one students, omded
s nsrucor ur - .
age enrolment in all of the collegiate classes in the classics was approximately twenty-one students, omded
among three classes. The class enrolments varied from three to sixteen with an average of seven. The instructor
carried in addition two units (ten hours a week) of secondary work.
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
teachers in the Missouri normal schools who could do much to pass on to their stu-
dents not only a subject which they have made vital in their own instruction but the
art of making it vital. Every course must be in a very real sense a teacher's course,
If the preparation of high school teachers of Latin could be assigned to a single
school; if then the instructor could concentrate upon six or eight fundamental
courses with the aforesaid aim, undistracted by the presence in his classes of students
who are taking Latin for purposes other than teaching, and unworried by demands
for "numbers/* he could conceivably do more to ensure the permanence of his subject
in the nation's culture than the heated arguments of the controversialist have so far
accomplished.1
(8) MODEEN FOREIGN LANGUAGES
In the total number of courses offered in modern foreign languages, the variations
among the five schools are not significant.2 Kirksville, however, concentrates its ener-
gies upon one language, while Warretisburg and Springfield provide instruction in
two, and Cape Girardeau in three.
The instructors' reports indicate that few If any of the courses are taken exclu-
sively by prospective teachers of foreign languages. In most cases, indeed, the enrol-
ment is far from homogeneous. It is consequently not to be expected that the instruc-
tion will reveal a clear adaptation to a professional purpose. With one exception, the
instructors report that the courses are conducted substantially as they would be in
any institution of similar grade. The exception is interesting in the light that it
throws on the kind of differentiation that is both possible and profitable:
"I usually have students visiting the course who have had several years of
German, but intend to teachs so various points are emphasized for their benefit
— that is: they are told that such points should be emphasized; it becomes a
conscious process; while these points are emphasized or drilled just as much
without their presence, the student is less conscious of the same process." (Class
in First-^year German.)
The fact that advanced students who are preparing to teach the subject attend
this beginners' class without credit for the sake of receiving this essentially profes-
sional instruction in the rudiments of the language is in itself testimony to the need
and value of courses of this type covering the fundamental subject-matter from the
point of view of the teacher. It is possible that, in the languages, visiting beginners'
classes of high school grade would be preferable for this purpose to enrolment in col-
legiate classes of the "review" type; but even in this case, there would be a distinct
advantage in having the visiting students actually registered in the class, under some-
1 What might be done, and one of the obstacles which prevents its being done more generally, will be clear from
the following report:
;* Not much of the pedagogical element is included, tout some. Whatever is stressed is pointed out and the learner
is made to know and feel the reason for this stress. Difficulties of Latin peculiar to Cicero are dwelt upon and
the method of mastering them constantly held up to the class. But as many take Latin who will probably not
teach, pedagogy is not made prominent." (Course in Cicero's Orations.')
* See page 407.
ACADEMIC COURSES : HISTORY 235
thing akin to the "participation" plan already referred to; that is, they should be
responsible for preparing each lesson and should be ready to "recite" as regular pupils.
In the advanced classes, too, there should be innumerable opportunities for the
kind of professional work that has been emphasized in the preceding discussions, —
that is, analysis of the students' own experiences in learning as a means for laying
bare the principles, precepts, and ideals of teaching. In so far as the observations
made in connection with the present study furnish a basis for judgment, it should
be said that the teaching of the modern languages in the normal schools is excep-
tionally well adapted to serve as a model of what expert and highly efficient teaching
in this field should do. It remains only to make its potential value dynamic by sys-
tematically bringing to the students' consciousness the details of artistry that con-
stitute so important a part of its excellence. Judging from the instructors' reports,,
these details are now left in the background for the student to detect and profit by
if he can. But the very essence of artistry in teaching, as in other fields, lies in the fact
that the elements which make it up are hard to detect. One looking upon a fine bit of
teaching is likely to be impressed by its apparent simplicity, and to conclude that
after all any one could do as well, — just as one is likely to gain a similar impression
from observing the finest acting or listening to good public speaking. Like the seri-
ous student of any art, the prospective teacher who is working with a real master
must get something more than the total effect of the masterly teaching : he must see
the elements that make up this total effect, and understand something of the part
that each plays. The best time to do this, we believe, is immediately after he has
himself gone thru with the very learning experience which it was the master's purpose
to bring about.
(4) HISTORY AND GOVERNMENT
What was said in the section that treated of the courses in English composition
and literature will hold in the main for the normal school courses in history. The
variations in the amount of work offered, among the different schools, are somewhat
wider than in the case of English.1 Kirksville provides collegiate courses in history,
government, and economics to the extent of one hundred semester hours, and in ad-
dition offers secondary courses aggregating two and two- thirds units, equivalent in
the demands upon the teaching staff to at least twenty semester hours. In history
Kirksville offers more work than the University of Missouri.2 The offerings in the
other normal schools, however, are significantly fewer, Springfield providing for only
thirty-seven and one-half semester hours with two and one-third units of secondary
courses.
Again, the question is not whether a normal school is to be criticised for offer-
1 See pages 407, 408.
2 The history offerings at the University of Missouri in 1911-18 totaled 60 semester hours; at Kirfcsrille, subtracting
the 30 'semester hours in government, economics, and sociology, the history offerings on the collegiate level amount
to 70 hours.
236 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
ing more work in a certain subject than is offered by a university; it is conceivable
that this may be justified. The question is rather whether the work that is offered
is designed to meet the particular professional need for which the normal school
exists. The outlines submitted in history reveal in fewer cases than those in English
any attempts to professionalize the work. Even in the reports on American history,
the replies indicate that there is no significant modification of the courses from the
academic type. The comment most frequently made is that nothing is attempted in
a pedagogical way beyond making the teaching as good as possible in order that it
may serve as a model; in three or four instances the instructors state that develop-
mental methods of teaching are emphasized much more than would be the case were
the students not preparing to teach. Two illustrations will typify the character of
nine-tenths of the responses :
" Formal pedagogy is little thought of. I have never really thought of consider-
ing the pedagogical and academic work as separate in this course. But I am try-
ing to teach teachers or prospective teachers. I do not believe, however, that I
would change the course a great deal if none of the people were to be teachers.
Of course if none were to be teachers, I would bother very little with special
reports on how to teach the subject in the high school." (Course in American
Constitutional History.}
" The pedagogical element consists mostly in the teacher's methods and exam-
ple. The course is more or less a 'model course.5"
It does not seem to be realized that however much or little a student may learn by
" unconscious imitation," nine-tenths of the value of a "model course" in subject-
matter, as in the training school, is lost on a prospective teacher unless the distinc-
tive elements that make it a "model"" are explicitly pointed out at the time. In his
attempts to do this many a normal school teacher might discover serious defects in
his teaching as measured by the results in individual cases, and it would not be unfair
to require him, as a model-maker, to measure his success by the extent to which he
could justify his procedure to his young critics. Such is precisely the problem of the
clinical operator.
The courses in civics and government are not essentially different from the courses
in history in this respect, with the exception of two or three courses that emphasize
community civics, where an explicit attempt is made to illustrate the use of local
materials. In describing one of the courses offered in the history of Missouri the
instructor also emphasized his efforts to acquaint students with the possibilities of
utilizing the immediate environment.
(5) MATHEMATICS
Collegiate courses in mathematics in the normal schools are relatively less nu-
merous than those in English and history, and in no school do they aggregate in
semester hours one-half of the corresponding offerings at the University of Missouri.
ACADEMIC COURSES : MATHEMATICS
Doubtless one reason for this lies in the fact that the preparation of the high school
teacher of mathematics is much mqp e definitely standardized than is the preparation
of the English or history teacher. It is generally assumed that, as a basis for teach-
ing secondary mathematics, one should have had collegiate courses in solid geometry,
trigonometry, college algebra, analytical geometry, and the calculus ; and the appear-
ance of these subjects upon the programs of normal schools that aim to prepare high
school teachers is to be expected. For good measure, two schools add the theory of
equations, four schools surveying, and two schools astronomy.1
It is open to question whether the courses in surveying and the theory of equa-
tions might not better be replaced with a composite course, somewhat similar in
scope to the "industrial mathematics" offered at Warrensburg, 2 but requiring as
prerequisites trigonometry, solid geometry, and perhaps analytical geometry and
the calculus, rather than being open to any high school graduate as is the Warrens-
burg course. In other words, would it not be well, upon the advanced training pro-
vided by the collegiate courses, to organize a distinct course in applied mathematics
that would enable the prospective high school teacher very richly to supplement the
secondary courses that lie is planning to teach? This could well include such infor-
mation regarding surveying as would be most useful to a high school teacher who,
after all, is not planning to give a technical training to embryo civil engineers, but
rather to utilize his knowledge of measurements as a basis for vivifying elementary
algebra and geometry. It could also include some reference to navigation, aviation,
machine construction, and other arts, the technical details of which are beyond the
high school pupil, but certain insights into which he may easily gain in connection
with his courses in elementary algebra and geometry. The normal school student who
is looking forward to high school teaching in mathematics could advantageously
take this "applied59 course after he has had the collegiate courses named, partic-
ularly in view of the fact that the accepted standards for preparing a high school
teacher of mathematics require him to take these collegiate courses in any case if he
wishes to qualify himself for the better positions.
It would seem, too, that for purposes of preparing the high school teacher, it
would be possible to reduce college algebra, analytical geometry, and the calculus
each to four semester hours in place of the five or six that most of the schools offer.
This with other possible reductions would make it feasible to offer and require one
or more courses dealing with the actual content of algebra and geometry as taught
in the high schools, — courses that would be " professionalized5"* in the same thorough-
going manner that has been described in connection with collegiate courses in the
elementary subjects. This, again, is a step that the normal schools of Missouri might
profitably take toward constructing real professional curricula for secondary teachers.
It is hardly necessary to quote in detail from the instructors' outlines the state-
ments that reveal as plainly as in the courses previously discussed the almost total
1 See page 408. 2 See Catalogue* 1917-18, page 80.
238 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
absence of any clear adaptation of the work to a professional purpose. In an old
and highly standardized subject like mathematics this is perhaps little to be won-
dered at, and yet the demands that mathematical study makes upon even the keen-
est native intelligence are so great that the experience of learning in this field could
be made of very great service in gaining an insight into the problems of teaching.
One of the instructors has at least glimpsed the possibilities in connection with the
study of the calculus, pointing out that the experiences of the students in master-
ing the process of integration may serve as an object-lesson for them in connection
with teaching the more elementary branches. But much more typical of the general
attitude of the mathematics instructors toward the general problem are the follow-
ing statements :
"I insist upon knowing* the subject. Those who expect to teach it will be able
to develop their own methods of doing so."1'
" As this is not a pedagogical subject no direct attention is given to the peda-
gogical side of the subject."
The normal schools have long reproached the " reactionary colleges and universi-
ties" for this attitude and deplored it; how comes it here?
(6) PHYSICS AKD CHEMISTRY
The collegiate offerings in physics and chemistry in the three schools that empha-
size most strongly the preparation of high school teachers seem on the whole to be
well selected.1 There is evidence, however, that the instructors are overloaded with
work, and this evidence was borne out by conferences with instructors at the time of
the visits to the schools. One instructor, for example, found it necessary to be in
classroom or laboratory from half-past seven in the morning until half-past five in
the evening, and to give his evenings and Saturdays very largely to the correction
of notebooks and reports. This instructor teaches during forty-eight weeks of the
year. The collegiate work in his subject (chemistry) is designed to prepare teachers
of the subject in high schools, and to give the essential basis in chemistry for special
teachers and supervisors of the household arts. Only five high schools in the district
served by this normal school, outside of one large city, offer courses in chemistry,
and it is quite unlikely that the demand for teachers of household arts in the dis-
trict will require more than four or five supervisors annually for many years to come.
A situation of this sort illustrates the marked unwisdom of a policy that permits
five normal schools of the state as well as the state university to attempt the prepa-
ration of practically all types of high school teachers and special supervisors.2
The instructors1 reports suggest that the work in the physical sciences is rather
more distinctly pointed toward the teaching problem than is the case in the depart-
ments heretofore discussed, altho the pedagogical element is usually fastened on to
1 See page 408. 2 See page 260.
ACADEMIC COURSES : BIOLOGY 239
the academic instruction rather than woven into it. The presence in the same classes
of students with different objectives is undoubtedly a handicap to a thoroughgoing
professional treatment, as is indicated by the following comments taken from the
course outlines:
"In the course in general chemistry, we cannot confine ourselves to the inter-
ests of any one group. Where the student is preparing to teach chemistry, we
advise with him as to the type, kind, etc., of materials needed, I also try to keep
such students in touch with the best literature on physical science teaching.
(Course in General Chemistry.}
"No attention paid to this [the pedagogical element]." (Course in Organic Chem-
istry ^ in which were enrolled at the time the report was given, prospective teach-
ers of chemistry, general science, household science, agriculture, and mathe-
matics.)
Occasionally, the typical university point of view crops out in the instructed
comments; for example:
".Difficulties met with in high school work and laboratory methods and manage-
ment are discussed incidentally, but our main effort is an attempt to present and
thoroughly acquaint the student with the fundamental principles of physics.
We work on the assumption that the student will be able to work out the details
for himself if the principles are understood." (Course in College Physics.)
(7) BOTANY, ZOOLOGY, PHYSIOLOGY, HYGIENE, AND SANITATION
Whether from the point of view of preparing teachers of the biological sciences
in the high school, and teachers of physiology, nature study, and general science in
the elementary school and junior high school, or from the point of view of laying an
adequate foundation in biological knowledge for the study of psychology, sociology,
and educational theory, the offerings and equipment of the Missouri normal schools
are notably defective.1 At the time that the present study was made, Kirksville offered
no biological courses of collegiate character except five semester hours of bacteri-
ology and one tennis work in physiology. Apparently the course in bacteriology may
be taken by students who have had no prerequisite biological work. The other schools
afford much better balanced biological programs, altho the offerings are less numerous
than in the physical sciences, except at Springfield, where the two groups are equal.
The neglect of the biological sciences is the more difficult to understand in view
of the liberal offerings in chemistry provided by four of the schools. The biological
sciences appear in the high school programs somewhat more friequently than chemis-
try, and they have a more intimate relation -than chemistry to the nature study and
geography of the elementary school, to physiology and hygiene, and to the general
or elementary science that is coming to find a place in junior high school programs.
From every point of view, then, it would seem that the biological sciences should
be the last to be neglected by the normal schools.
1 See page 408.
240 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
At Kirksviile seven and one-half hours of physiology, sanitation, and hygiene
are offered, but no work in these subjects is required for any of the collegiate de-
grees or diplomas, Warrensburg offers five hours of hygiene, but this is apparently
not required. Maryville requires for all of the collegiate diplomas a course in " Home
Economics and Sanitation." Springfield also requires two and one-half semester
hours in sanitation. Cape Girardeau has no offerings in this field.
If the biological courses are taught differently in the normal schools than they
are in institutions of general education, there is nothing in the reports of the instruc-
tors to show it. In spite of the almost innumerable points at which a knowledge of
biology could be made to enrich and vivify instruction in many of the subjects taught
in the elementary and secondary schools, the actual organization of these courses in
the normal schools follows very closely the academic or "pure science" model. The
courses in hygiene and sanitation reveal somewhat more definitely the dominance of
a professional aim, altho even here the adaptation is slight.
(8) GEOGRAPHY AND GEOLOGY
In view of the emphasis given by the normal schools to the preparation of high school
teachers, the meagreness of the offerings in geography causes no surprise.1 Most of the
collegiate work is in physiography, and here Kirksviile and Maryville offer a suffi-
cient amount of work to equip a student to teach physiography as a minor subject
in the high school. The course at Springfield is reported by the instructor to be
planned definitely as " a basis for geography teachers," only a few of whom expect to
teach physiography in the high school; in other words, the course is organized pri-
marily for prospective elementary teachers. In the remaining schools, too, it is evi-
dent that the work in physiography is more definitely professionalized than are the
science courses previously discussed. At the same time, the absence of courses in gen-
eral geography and the fact that none of the schools requires a course in this subject
in any of the collegiate curricula point again to the neglect by these schools of the
type of subject-matter that the elementary teacher most needs.
(9) AGRICULTURE
The normal schools5 offerings in agriculture on the collegiate level are relatively
numerous at Kirksviile, — forty-five semester hours in the aggregate, in addition
to one secondary unit.3 In two of the other schools, also, a substantial number of
courses are offered. It would undoubtedly be in the interests both of efficiency and
economy to limit the preparation of high school teachers of agriculture to one or at
most two of the normal schools and the College of Agriculture at the university. At
the present time two institutions, each offering a good curriculum for such teachers,
could amply meet the demands of the state. The provision of elementary courses in
1 See page 408. 2 See page 409.
ACADEMIC COURSES : AGRICULTURE
agriculture for rural school teachers should, obviously, be made in all institutions
preparing students for this service.
The attitude of the teachers of agriculture toward the professional problem as re-
vealed on their outlines is interesting in that it is, in many cases, a distinct exception
to the general rule that instructors in the "newer" subjects take much more interest
in teaching as an art than do instructors in the "traditional*" subjects. Some of the
comments on the outlines are indeed illuminating; they are reproduced verbatim et
literatim as presented :
" The students in this course are usually loaded with educational pedagogy at
time of taking this course. They need information on the Gospel of agriculture.
How to meet the patrons of their communities in his own environments, that is,
the teacher of agriculture, first of all should know a good animal, good type of
plant, a well-prepared seed bed, and the like. [How the architect of this sen-
tence won his diploma merits a special investigation.]
" The work should be definite, not just the study of corn as an assignment,
but make definite assignment, as Seed Selection, Storing seed corn, corn har-
vesting machinery. All the Practicums which is the major part of the course
emphasize I Object — II Procedure — III Results — IV Questions — and V Con-
clusions." (Course in Crop Production.)
66 1 have give no attention to the pedagogical side of the work more than to point
out the oportunities that the rural teacher has as a leader in the social activities
of his district." (Course in Rural Economics.)
"I teach as I was taught in an agricultural college. The ability to do rather than
to teach is the thing stressed.
"I teach as though every student was going to start a garden of his own im-
mediately.
" Owing to the limited amount of time available little attention is given to the
pedagogical side of the subject. The book is followed rather closely. When the
opportunity presents itself methods of teaching are given*" (Course in Elemen-
tary Agriculture.)
The above excerpts are fairly characteristic of seven out of the eight instructors
in agriculture who submitted reports in 1915. The eighth, however, has really seen
and appreciated the problem of professionalizing his work :
" . . . the whole trend of "the course is influenced by the fact that students are
to be teachers of the subject. I give a very few lessons which are specifically ped-
agogy of the subject. However, I doubt if there are any lessons given that do
not have some of this element in it. I will give here just a few of the topics
which are taken up 'in the course of events.' 4 Why agriculture should be taught
in schools,' 'How to use the surrounding farms for illustrative materials,' * Types
of school gardens for the country and what a school garden is supposed to
do,' 6 Apparatus desirable for a country school,' * What a rural teacher can do
to make the rural boy and girl realize the necessity of selecting good germi-
nal seed,' 'How to teach conservation of soil fertility.' Only the first topic has
a formal place in the course. All of the others are taken up incidentally when
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
the class is on the topics in question. I also ask quite a number of questions in
this form : What questions would you ask a farmer if one whom you did not
know well should ask you the question — 'Would it pay me to plow my soil
deep?" I do not think that I would ask so many questions in this form if my
students were not to be teachers." (Course in General Agriculture.)
(10) FINE ARTS
The variation among the five normal schools in the courses offered in music, draw-
ing, painting, and similar subjects is striking,1 and again suggests the importance of
designating certain single institutions as training schools for special types of teachers.2
As in most of the "special" subjects, the courses in graphic art show a commend-
able adaptation to the professional needs of the students, in that emphasis is com-
monly laid upon the types of work and materials that are available for art instruction
in the elementary and secondary schools. The elective system, however, leads to a
mixture of students that cannot fail to handicap the most effective teaching of the
subject for professional purposes. Thus in the spring of 1915, a course in advanced
drawing at Warrensburg enrolled prospective kindergartners, primary teachers, in-
termediate and upper grade teachers, high school teachers of English, history, math-
ematics, and foreign languages, and art supervisors; a course in free-hand drawing
at Kirksville enrolled prospective kindergarten and primary teachers, intermediate
and upper grade teachers, and art supervisors ; a course at Cape Girardeau in design
as applied to basketry enrolled prospective teachers of the kindergarten and all ele-
mentary grades, high school teachers of English and history, and supervisors of art,
music, and manual training. If the training of special art teachers and supervisors
were limited to one of the schools, the number of offerings in the other schools could
be reduced, as has been suggested, and the energies of the instructors could then be
devoted to the basic courses, differentiated in respect to the type of work (primary,
intermediate, upper grade) which the various groups of students have in view. Brief,
undifferentiated courses in art appreciation and the history of art should also find
a place in all of the longer curricula.
In music it would be advantageous to limit the advanced courses in harmony, couu-
terpoint, instrumentation, and orchestration to one school for the preparation of
supervisors and special teachers. In the schools not giving such advanced curricula
there should be a carefully constructed program in music adapted to the needs of
elementary and high school teachers. Doubtless there will need to be some differen-
tiation in this program, — the primary and kindergarten teacher, for example, should
have a type of instruction that the upper grade and high school teachers will not
require.
In addition to this basic work, which should be required of all, individual lessons
in voice, piano, violin, and perhaps other instruments should be available without
1 See page 409. 2 See pagre 262.
ACADEMIC COURSES : COMMERCIAL SUBJECTS
fee to all students who can profit by such instruction. This policy is clearly in har-
mony with the professional purpose of the normal school, and has been carried into
effect at Kirks ville with excellent results. If the unusual interest in music that has been
developed there could be awakened in all normal schools, it would be greatly to the
advantage of the public schools throughout the state. The policy of paying for musical
instruction in the normal schools by giving teachers of music the privilege of taking
private pupils should be abandoned.
Perhaps more generally than in other subjects do the teachers of music in the nor-
mal schools utilize the learning experiences of their students as a basis for ensur-
ing pedagogical skill, and this seems to be true of the courses in appreciation as well
as of the courses in technique, where the application of this principle is probably a
simpler matter. The following reports reveal some of the possibilities that have been
recognized and utilized:
"Practically all pedagogy (applied). If the student can't sing himself he must
instruct some one of the class as to just how he wants the work sung. He must
analyze and explain the poem. In fact he is teaching instead of reciting." (Course
in Vocal Forms.)
"Pedagogy enters in this to a considerable extent. In fact the course must be
pedagogical as its main purpose is to give the student the ability to create a
taste for music thru being able to teach the higher forms and make them under-
stood by the average listener. Secondarily no one will orchestrate a work well
who does not understand form. As an illustration : The student is placed at the
piano to play by hand or by mechanism a Chopin Nocturne. He must first
explain the 'form,' not to the teacher but to the class, as a lecturer. He must
then play it, bringing out the melody, set proper tempo, etc. In fact he must do
exactly as he would in trying to make a group of boys and girls or men and
women understand and appreciate the work. In orchestral forms he must take
a baton and direct some of the simpler symphonies, using the school orches-
tra as an experimental body. Every director is necessarily a teacher. Here is an
excellent opportunity to discover whether or no the student has the ability to
impart his knowledge to others. [And incidentally to find out if he has any
knowledge to impart.]" (Course in Instrumental Form.)
(11) COMMERCIAL SUBJECTS
There is a demand for teachers of commercial subjects in the high schools of Mis-
souri, and one of the normal schools should be well equipped to meet it. At the present
time, four of the schools — Kirksville, Warrensburg, Cape Girardeau, and Mary ville
— are each attempting to train commercial teachers,1 with the result that "the work
is not well done in any of them. Many students enroll in the commercial courses who
do not intend to teach the subjects. In one of the schools, for example, seventeen stu-
dents were enrolled in four courses in stenography and typewriting; of these, eight
definitely stated on the class census slips that they did not intend to teach at all, and
1 See pares 409, 410.
ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
of the remaining nine, only one acknowledged an ambition to become a commercial
teacher. In the spring term of 1915, one hundred seven students were enrolled in the
commercial courses at Cape Girardeau, — apparently a normal enrolment for the de-
partment. The instructor stated in conference that " about three or four" teachers
of commercial subjects were among the graduates of the last graduating class. It is
clear, then, that the courses are attended by many students who are not preparing
to teach the subjects, and without doubt by a goodly number who are not prepar-
ing to teach at all. The presence in the commercial classes of these students, some of
whom are very young, is a misuse of the normal school, and cannot fail to handicap
the instructors in their efforts to prepare commercial teachers.
At Kirksville, two instructors are employed for commercial subjects, but at the
other schools the courses in bookkeeping, shorthand, and typewriting are taught by
a single teacher, — and this teacher not infrequently has other duties- thrust upon
him. At Cape Girardeau, for example, in the spring of 1915, the instructor had charge
of all of the accounting for two dormitories, — collecting all board bills, paying for
all services and supplies, and ordering supplies and equipment. He did much of his
ordering in August and September, and was therefore deprived of a vacation. All of
the bookkeeping and correspondence he did without assistance, except for the type-
writing that he could delegate to his classes for practice purposes. His hours at school
were from half-past seven in the morning until five in the evening, and most of his
clerical work was necessarily done at night.
Under the circumstances, there is naturally little effort in the various schools to
professionalize the commercial courses with reference to the teaching problem. One
instructor, when asked to point out the pedagogical elements in a course in type-
writing, replied : " The effect of the will and mind upon the action of the fingers in
the operation of the machine" — whatever this may mean. Another report states that
about one-tenth of the time in a course in bookkeeping is spent in discussing " how
to present various phases of the subject, etc., especially the theoretical with the prac-
tical." The majority of the reports, however, are either silent as to the pedagogical
problem, or state that the courses are organized essentially as they would be were the
students not planning to teach. In general, the work did not show marked deviations
from what one might find in the commercial classes of a small high school or in a
business college.
Penmanship appears among the offerings of the commercial department in three
of the schools, but it is noteworthy that in only two of the schools (Springfield and
Maryville) is there a definite requirement in penmanship in the one-year and two-
year collegiate curricula. It would seem incumbent upon every normal school to re-
quire instruction and drill in penmanship and in blackboard writing until each stu-
dent has attained to a satisfactory standard as measured by one of the handwriting
scales.
ACADEMIC COURSES : HOME ECONOMICS
MANUAL OR INDUSTRIAL ARTS
Instructors in the manual and industrial arts in the Missouri normal schools have
usually to supervise practice teaching in these subjects as well as to teach the normal
school students. In every school, therefore, the burden upon these departments is
unusually heavy.1 Under these conditions, the attempt of any of the schools to pre-
pare special supervisors of manual training without much better staffs and equipment
than are now provided is greatly to be deplored. Four of the schools, however, are
making this attempt, and in at least three of these the type of handwork in which
every teacher in the elementary and rural schools should have some training is being
seriously neglected. Springfield, Cape Girardeau, and Maryville make a definite re-
quirement in the manual and industrial arts for students enrolled in the one-year
and two-year collegiate curricula. At Springfield the energies of the department are
given to these non-specializing students, and the preparation of special teachers and
supervisors is not undertaken.
In the two schools that emphasize the training of special teachers and supervisors,
the classes are not limited to students looking forward to this work; one instructor re-
ports explicitly that students are encouraged to take the work for purposes other than
teaching. Even where a requirement of manual arts is made, any one of a number of
elective courses may be taken to meet the requirement. In other words, except in the
case of primary handwork, there seems to have been no specific effort to construct a
course that will give the student, who is not planning to specialize in this field, just the
kind of training that will help him most in his work as a grade or rural school teacher.
The instructor in charge of the department at Springfield is the only one who reports
that he makes a special effort to adjust his courses in woodworking to this group.
(13) HOME ECONOMICS
The situation in respect to home economics is somewhat similar to that in the in-
dustrial arts.2 Relatively few special teachers and supervisors of the subject are re-
quired; at least, the demand is not sufficient to justify each of the schools in offering
a large number of courses for the training of these special teachers. Women who will
teach in the rural schools, on the other hand, will find it advantageous to know some-
thing of sewing, nursing, and foods and cooking. Neither of these groups seemed to
constitute a majority of those who were enrolled during the spring of 1915 in the
courses in home economics. One-fourth of one hundred twenty-one registrants re-
porting stated that they did not intend to teach at all; twenty-nine per cent said
that they were planning either to teach high school subjects other than home eco-
nomics or to take graded school appointments; slightly smaller than the latter group
was that which comprised the students distinctly preparing for special home eco-
1 See page 410. In one of the schools in the spring term of 1915, the instructor in manual arts spent six periods a day
with normal school and high school classes, and one period a day with training-school pupils. He also reported that
he was teaching two classes in geography.
2 See page 410.
246 ORGANIZATION OF CURRICULA
nomics teaching and supervision; while only one-eighth of the total number reported
that they were looking toward rural school service.
It may be safely inferred, then, that more than one-half of the students enrolled
in home economics courses during the term referred to were not taking the work for
teaching purposes. At one of the schools (Springfield) the head of the department
said? in response to a question upon this point, that the majority of the students were
taking the courses "for the work," altho "some are preparing to teach the sub-
ject." At another school, the instructor in sewing reported "a good deal of pressure
to make the classes large," with the result that some of her classes enrolled elemen-
tary school pupils, normal school students of collegiate grade, and married women
from the community, all working together. It would seem most desirable to provide
separate classes for those who are undertaking certain elementary courses for non-pro-
fessional purposes, and both to restrict the advanced classes to intending specialists
and to organize the work of these courses with explicit reference to their professional
purpose. Certainly one of the schools would be sufficient, with the university, to meet
the demand for specialists* The remaining schools could then limit their courses, staff,
and equipment to the numbers and amount needed to give elementary instruction
to the normal school students who wish to carry this work as an extra study, and to
provide whatever supervision may be needed in the training schools.
LIBRARY ECONOMY
Kirks ville requires a full term (five hours a week) of library economy in all of the
collegiate curricula. When this course was visited in the spring term of 1915, the
work was quite technical in its nature, involving familiarity with the methods of
cataloguing, and including training in the preparation of catalogue cards. In the
later announcements of courses (1917), the work seems to have been so modified that
the technical features are covered during the first two weeks and the remainder of
the term is given to the study of children's literature.
In the other schools, instruction in the use of the library is commonly provided
for more or less incidentally,1 — often during some of the periods set apart for gen-
eral assemblies. There can be little doubt that the work is important enough to merit
a separate course that may well be a constant in all curricula and given soon after
the student enters the school. The equivalent of one hour a week for a term should
be sufficient for this purpose. Students who are planning to teach English or history
in high schools may be expected to take a more extended course which will prepare
them not only to make intelligent assignments for the library work of their pupils,
but also to take charge of a small high school library, or to act as assistants to the
librarian in a larger school.
Kirksville and Cape Girardeau offer more extended courses which suggest that
they have in mind the need of some equipment in library technique upon the part
1 See page 410.
QUALITY OF TEACHING
of certain high school teachers. The seven and one-half hours offered by Kirksville
(a full year's work) seem excessive for the purpose; the four hours provided by
Cape Girardeau will probably prove to be as much time as a teacher whose chief
work is in English or history can afford to give to library technique,
(15) PHYSICAL TRAINING*
Work in physical training is not required at Kirksville, altho an abundance of
elective opportunities are offered. At Cape Girardeau, all one-year and two-year col-
legiate curricula must be accompanied throughout by "physical practice/' and for this
required work no credit is granted. At Warrensburg, " all students are required to
take physical training three hours a week during half as many terms as they are en-
rolled and in attendance," — a requirement that must be rather hard to "check." At
Springfield, a term's course in physical training is required for the one-year and two-
year curricula. At Maryville, the requirement is two and one-half semester hours.
In view of the basic significance of physical welfare to the state and nation, a
larger emphasis on physical training in the normal schools is most urgent. Physical
exercises, involving either formal work or active participation in plays and games,
should be a part of each student's daily program. The policy of satisfying require-
ments by concentrating physical exercise into a ternr's course seems hardly consistent
with the twofold purpose of this important work: (1) the preservation of health and
the formation of effective health habits and ideals upon the part of the student, and
(£) the preparation of every prospective teacher to participate in some measure in the
recreational activities of his pupils.
C. THE QUALITY OF NOBMAL SCHOOL TEACHING AS AN ELEMENT IN THE CUBRICULUM
It is not the purpose of this section to attempt an evaluation of the teaching in the
normal schools from the point of view of its specific efficiency in imparting knowledge
and skill to students. To yield satisfactory conclusions, such aprocedure would involve
not only an elaborate program of tests and examinations, but also a comparison of
the results with norms and standards that are not as yet available in the field of higher
and professional education. The aim in the present discussion is rather to determine,
if possible, the extent to which the actual class work of these schools serves the stu-
dent as an object lesson in the art of teaching. In the preceding sections, each sub-
ject of the curriculum has been examined from the point of view of its relation to
the professional purpose of the school; it is from this same point of view that the
teaching will be discussed. In other words, quite aside from the content of instruc-
tion, the teaching itself may be looked upon as an essential, possibly the essential, part
of the professional curriculum.
1 See page 410.
ELEMENTS IN THE CURRICULUM
THE NORMAL SCHOOL INSTRUCTOR PRIMARILY A TEACHEE
The policies of normal school administration have naturally favored the selection
of teachers of marked ability. In the earlier days3 these teachers were often recruited
from among those who had achieved unusual recognition in the schools of the sur-
rounding territory. More recently the demand for higher qualifications in scholarship
has shifted the source of supply to the coUeges and universities, but the appointees
almost invariably have had a period of successful experience in elementary or high
schools preceding their graduate study. Occasionally the graduate student who looks
to productive scholarship rather than to teaching for his real career accepts a normal
school appointment— perhaps because the coveted opportunity to enter university
work is not presented; but if such a person remains in the professional school, the
pressure of the heavy program of teaching and the general absence of sympathy for
the point of view of pure research usually combine either to transform or to repress
his earlier ambitions. The typical normal school instructor is first of all a teacher, and
in Missouri he is not infrequently a teacher of exceptional talent and aptitude for
his work.
CHARACTERISTICS OF NORMAL SCHOOL TEACHING
From the point of view of general classroom procedure, the teaching with which
the students of the normal school come into contact represents the kind that they
will be expected to do in their later work, especially if they teach in the upper grades
or in the high school. The "lecture method," against which so many criticisms of col-
lege teaching have been leveled, is little in evidence even in the normal schools of the
collegiate type. In fact, the infrequency of the lecture and the prevalence of the class
recitation and discussion constitute the most noticeable distinction between these
schools and the liberal-arts colleges.
The quality of the teaching, however, is far from uniform. Excellent teaching and
poor teaching may be found in each of the normal schools and training schools. There
is some variation as to departments : in the visits made with the present study in view,
the best teaching was found most frequently in the classes in history, German, Latin,
English, and mathematics. Poor teaching seemed to be most prevalent in agriculture,
the^physical and biological sciences, and education (including psychology), altho in
each of these departments instances of really superior work were not infrequently
observed. The relatively poor showing made by the instructors in professional subjects
may be explained in part by the still unsatisfactory organization of the materials in-
cluded in these courses, but it is much more readily accounted for by the fact that
the normal schools have selected a less highly educated and less well-trained group of
teachers for the professional courses than for the academic courses.1 The teachers of
agriculture and the natural sciences, while on the whole as well educated as are the
teachers of language and history, do not seem to represent as high a level of native
1 See page 283.
QUALITY OF TEACHING 249
ability, — due perhaps to competition from other fields for technically trained men. It
should also be recognized that agriculture is not yet well organized for teaching pur-
poses, and that the teaching of the physical and biological sciences is regarded not
only in normal schools but in colleges generally as less satisfactory than the teaching
of mathematics and the humanities.
The varying excellence of the teachings however. Is not to be explained entirely
by these departmental differences, for the greatest contrasts will be found side by side
in the same department. The unevenness of teaching in the normal schools may be
traced directly to the same causes that operate widely with like result in colleges and
secondary schools. Practically all such institutions compare very unfavorably in this re-
spect with well-supervised elementary schools where, altho the teachers are commonly
less mature and always less well educated, the uniformity of really superior teaching is
often remarkable. The difference is due both to the better professional training of the
elementary teacher and to the factor of critical supervision that forms a potent stim-
ulus to the acquisition and maintenance of a high level of teaching skill. Not only are
the teachers of the secondary and higher institution largely untrained in the tech-
nique of teaching, but the stimulus of supervision is completely lacking. The tra-
ditions of higher education are violently opposed to classroom visitation and criti-
cism. The notion that one who has mastered one's subject-matter is thereby qualified
to teach it leads apparently to the absurd corollary that one who is not an expert in
the subject is disqualified from criticising the teaching.1 The large high schools in
which the teachers are almost exclusively subject-matter specialists bred to the uni-
versity point of view have reflected the same prejudice against supervision. In many
of the normal schools the same general attitude prevails, altho very greatly tempered
by the professional character of the work. Presidents and principals, too, are not infre-
quently loath to assume the responsibilities of classroom supervision, in part because
they do not wish to offend their teachers or to seem unduly to interfere with their free-
dom, in part from lack of time and opportunity, and in part, also, because of the gen-
eral feeling that one who lias been appointed to a normal school instructorship must
be ipso facto a superior teacher, whose need for direction and advice has passed with
his apprentice days.
TEACHING SHOULD BE EXEMPLARY
It would, indeed, be unfortunate if normal school instructors were to be subjected
to petty, narrow-minded, faultfinding criticism. On the other hand, there is need for
ensuring a much higher level of classroom efficiency than is now to be found in these
schools. The initial skill of the teachers who are sent out from the normal school will
1 This attitude is well illustrated by the following extract from the report of the Wisconsin normal school^ survey
(1914); the words are those of an instructor reporting upon the amount and kind of classroom supervision given by
the president of the school :
" . . . How much real supervision can a president do regarding the work of a department in which the man in
charge has specialized in his subjects in college and has spent three to four years in further postgraduate study?
The president can only at best have a general knowledge of the work." (Page 129.)
250 ELEMENTS IN THE CURHICULUM
depend in no small measure upon the teaching to which they have themselves been sub-
jected. It is true that the demonstrations of good class work in the laboratory school
are intended to furnish such models., but the actual teaching in the normal school
classes is of even greater significance. The instruction in these classes should be in-
telligent and spirited, — and this, generally speaking, it is in the Missouri normal
schools. But it should be more than this : technically it should be as nearly perfect as
it can be made. Fortunately or unfortunately, it is the externals of teaching that the
student will most frequently tend to imitate; the stronger and more vital the teach-
ing, the greater the likelihood that these externals will be reproduced. Even the idio-
syncrasies and mannerisms of an effective teacher are more likely to be perpetuated
in the initial teaching of his students than are his enthusiasm and the spirit of his
instruction. If the technique is bad, then, even tho for the immediate purposes its ills
are more than counterbalanced by its vigor, enthusiasm, and inspirational force, the
effect upon the prospective teacher is unfortunate.
Because good teaching is a matter primarily of knowledge and enthusiasm, it is not
to be inferred that its external character — its form as contrasted with its deeper pur-
pose— is of but superficial significance. "Good form" in teaching bears the same rela-
tionship to efficient teaching that good form in writing bears to efficient writing.
Knowledge and enthusiasm are essential in either case, else the teaching or the writ-
ing will be empty or dead, or both. Substance and vitality are of course to be chosen
in preference to form alone, if all three cannot be had; but to assume, as many clitics
of " pedagogy55 have assumed, that one who chooses substance and vitality must avoid
good form and vice versa, is as absurd as to assume that good English can be spoken
only by those who have nothing to say, or that vigorous English is always crude
English.
The analogy may well be pushed further. Just as the ability to use language in good
form depends largely upon the measure in which good form has characterized the lan-
guage that one has most frequently listened to and most frequently read, so the abil-
ity to teach effectively and with distinction will depend upon the measure in which
good form has characterized the teaching to which one has been accustomed.
There can be no doubt that the normal schools should set a higher premium than
they now do upon classroom teaching that is unimpeachable from the point of view of
technique. The emphasis that normal schools formerly laid upon this factor was doubt-
less misplaced, not because technique was then or is now unimportant, but because
suci. emphasis lacked balance. It was based on the assumption that form was an end
in itself, and it was certainly accompanied by a tendency to belittle the content with
which it dealt. But that time has passed; under the sting of criticism from the col-
leges and the universities, the normal schools of to-day are not infrequently quite as
insistent upon the priority of "scholarship" and quite as impatient with the assump-
tions of "mere method1' as are their academic critics, forgetting that this view, too,
is narrow and dogmatic in its own way. The form of teaching, after all, is an impor-
QUALITY OF TEACHING
tant and usually an Indispensable factor In the efficiency of teaching, and the artist's
attitude which, far from neglecting form, seeks to master it and to make It render
the largest possible service, is as important in teaching as It is in painting, sculpture,
architecture, writing, and acting.
THE ELEMENTS OF GOOD TEACHING
The technical elements in the art of teaching maybe grouped into two classes, which
may be termed for convenience (1) the external elements of skill and (2) the elements
of insight and resourcefulness. The former are by far the simpler, and under proper
guidance may be acquired by any teacher. They can be most easily identified in a
negative way by such common classroom errors as repeating answers, limiting recita-
tions to responsive members of the class, being satisfied with "concert" responses, call-
ing on students before stating the question to be answered or the topic to be discussed,
failing to speak distinctly, to write clearly, to establish a systematic and habitual
method of caring for routine matters, to make definite assignments, and to ensure
throughout the recitation the active effort of all members of the class. Few recitations
are free from all of these defects, and In the normal school classes observed in Mis-
souri, they were certainly less frequently noticed than they would have been in a
high school or a college. They were, however, much more prevalent than one would
expect in institutions devoted expressly to teaching as a fine art, and much more
prevalent than in the classrooms of a well-supervised system of graded elementary
schools.1
We are speaking here of defects in classroom technique that would seldom occur
if good habits had been firmly established early in the teacher's career. The reason
that they are so generally characteristic even of otherwise superior teachers is not
that these teachers are ignorant of the few simple rules that summarize good class-
room procedure, but rather that, in the absence of supervision, they have been too
little impressed with their responsibility for developing habits of good form in teach-
ing. When one remembers what a wide difference there is between merely understand-
ing the requirements of good usage in spoken language and the habitual recognition
J The following extract from a verbatim report of a lesson in ancient history illustrates in an exaggerated form some
of these defects:
Teacher: The Achaean civilization extends down to when?
Student: 1500 to 1200.
Teacher: 1200; right. What man appears before the close of this period?
Student: Homer.
Teacher: What did the Achaeans bring to Greece?
Student: Iron.
Teacher: Iron; that's right.
The instructor spends a few minutes in discussing the significance of the introduction of iron; presently—
Teacher: Then we come to what people?
Student: Dorians.
Teacher: Dorians; yes. What part of Greece was settled by the Dorians?
Student: Peloponnesus.
Teacher: Peloponnesus; yes. What was the main town?
Student (after some delay): Athens.
Teacher: Athens ; no.
Student: Sparta.
Teacher: Sparta ; yes.
ELEMENTS IN THE CURRICULUM
of these requirements in one's own speech, it is readily perceived why intelligent and
informed teachers often break the simplest rules of their art. Where the pressure of
responsibility is absent, the transformation of principles and precepts into well-estab-
lished habits is almost certain to be slow or to halt completely.
The second group of elements comprising the art of teaching — the elements of
insight and resourcefulness — are obviously more important than the external ele-
ments of skill Reference is here made to such factors as aptness and readiness in
illustration; clearness and lucidity in explanation and exposition; a keen sensitiveness
to evidences of misunderstanding and misinterpretation upon the part of pupils and
students; dexterity and alertness in devising problems and framing questions that
will focus the attention of the class upon just the right points; a sense of humor that
will relieve tense or wearisome situations; the intellectual attitude that requires of
itself a reasoned support of each point presented; quickness to detect inattention and
lack of aggressive effort upon the part of pupils and students; a sense of proportion
that ensures the emphasis of salient topics, and distinguishes between the fundamental
and the accessory. These and similar qualities or abilities play an all-important role in
successful teaching; they are the finer, less obvious factors in "good form;" and they
differ from the elements of skill in that they depend upon intelligent adaptation rather
than upon habituated processes. They mean not only the possession of resources in the
way of knowledge, not only an understanding of child nature or of the capacities and
interests of adolescents, but also readiness in summoning resources, initiative in adapt-
ing them to rapidly changing situations, and a kind of rapport with one's class that
strikes very much deeper than a mere understanding of its capacities and limitations.
All good teachers certainly are "born" teachers in the sense that their native
endowment permits the development of these and similar abilities. Their success pre-
supposes a certain native "talent" for teaching, just as success in any of the fine arts
presupposes certain native talents. It is fair to assume that innate talent for teach-
ing, taken in this sense, is much more widely distributed than is talent for music or
for painting, — so broad and comprehensive is the field of teaching and so signifi-
cant to human evolution has been the guidance of the immature. Of the importance
of native talent there can be no doubt. In the training of teachers there has been
a tendency to go to one extreme or the other: either the native character of teaching
talent has been exalted to the extent of assuming that training is useless, or the sig-
nificance of native talent has been denied to the point of asserting that the art of
teaching is merely a matter of understanding and applying certain precepts and prin-
ciples. The rational view that really successful teaching must rest upon a foundation
of native talent, but that these gifts can be immeasurably improved by training, has
been slow to develop. As a result, one finds "born" teachers even in the normal schools
quite unconscious of the refinements that are possible in their art. Just as the "born"
painter or musician, entirely without training, may do work that shows real but crude
ability, so the "born11 teacher, likewise untrained, may teach with undeniable success,
QUALITY OF TEACHING
but also crudely — which is to say more or less wastefully, and falling far short of a
maximum of effectiveness.
Because of the lack of technical criticism already noted, it is not surprising that
the normal school teachers as a group are stronger in those elements of their art that
depend upon insight and resourcefulness than they are in what we have termed the
elements of skill. But these defects in technique should be remedied, in order that
the students may live constantly in an atmosphere of "good form" in teaching. Fur-
thermore,, the virtues of insight and resourcefulness, by as much as they are more
difficult of analysis, should be made the objects of the students' conscious attention
and study. The teacher himself is the laboratory for the demonstration of these qual-
ities; they are less likely to be imitated than are the more external factors of good
form, and unless they are made explicit to the student, the school fails to utilize
resources of very large value that are immediately at hand.
UTILIZING- GOOD MODELS
There are two means within the reach of every normal school by which this end
may be sought. In the first place, instructors who know and appreciate each other's
work can do much by calling the students" attention to the successful qualities of
other teachers. For example, one teacher is especially skilful in utilizing the devel-
opmental or Socratic method of teaching. Ordinarily the students will like his work,
but they do not always know why. To get them to study it professionally — to watch
the lesson evolve under the master's direction; to note the purpose in the asking of
this, that, or the other question; to see why this illustration is adduced, why that
suggestion was not followed up, why this rather than the other topic was elaborated —
will mean that the students appreciation will be keener and his appropriation more
intelligent. There are innumerable opportunities in the work of every instructor thus
to throw into relief the high points in Ms colleagues' teaching — provided that he
knows it well. A systematic interchange of visits1 among instructors could be made
gradually to lead to this result, and to render the added service of promoting the
general integration of all of the school's activities by securing a more intimate mutual
understanding among all members of the staff.
A second method of making the students conscious of the finer points in the art
of teaching as exemplified by their instructors is to adopt the plan, reported by one
of the Missouri normal school teachers, of making it natural and customary for the
students at the close of the hour to ask for the justification of any step taken by the
teacher in conducting the class. The careful use of a brief period at the close of the
class exercise for the express purpose of discussing the technique of the lesson would,
we believe, exert a helpful influence upon aU concerned.
1 Such visits have been repeatedly recommended and urged by normal school presidents, but the only way in which
to ensure them is to make them a part of the stated duties of the instructor,— with time freely granted for the pur-
pose. In a school of forty or fifty instructors it should not be impossible for each one to see the classwork of each of
the others at least once a year.
ELEMENTS IN THE CURRICULUM
The discussion of insight and resourcefulness as elements of the teacher's art has
so far been concerned with the means by which these qualities, as exemplified in the
work of the normal school teachers, could be made objects of study and imitation
by normal school students. There is another problem associated with these factors
that merits consideration. An instructor who has an unusual measure of native talent
for teaching often fails to grow, and the problem of ensuring his progressive develop-
ment must be a matter of concern to those responsible for normal school efficiency.
Not every teacher can attain old age still doing his work with all of the enthusiasm
of youth expressed in a consummate art which the years have ripened and matured.
Such growth is undoubtedly subject to natural limitations which vary widely among
individuals. The problem is to ensure that each individual shall approach as closely
as possible to the maximum of his capacity, and there is no doubt that the conditions
of work in many normal schools to-day are unfavorable to such continued growth.
Some of these conditions are discussed elsewhere in this report,1 but there are certain
suggestions that are particularly pertinent here. ,
STIMULATING GOOD TEACHING-
In the first place, steady and continued growth in power to teach is not to be ex-
pected in the absence of recognition and appreciation of one's work. Under pres-
ent conditions it is the rare exception that expertness in the very art for which the
normal school stands earns an adequate recognition and reward. There is, indeed,
no system by which unusually effective teaching may be recognized and rewarded.
Where the elective system prevails, the popularity of the teacher with his students
and his ability to attract large numbers to his courses constitute one means of meas-
uring his efficiency, but it may be a most deceptive measure in that it constantly
tempts the teacher into policies and practices that succeed not because they mean
expert teaching but because they employ the seductive arts of flattery or the tempt-
ing bait of low standards.
In the second place, progressive development in the higher qualifications for in-
struction cannot be expected from teachers whose hours of stated classroom duties
are so long as quite to preclude the preparation necessary for first-class work. When
a teacher must teach five periods a day for five days in the week and for forty-eight
weeks in the year, his only hope of survival lies in the most careful husbanding of
his own energy. The hours are neither long nor arduous for one who teaches by rou-
tine, who puts just as little of himself into his work as is consistent with keeping his
class from drowsiness or disorder, and who limits his daily preparation to a cursory
glance over the advance lesson to make certain that there are no points at which
he can be caught. Such a teacher may carry twenty-five or even thirty-five hours of
class work each week throughout forty-eight weeks of the year, and live to a vigorous
1 See pages 276 ff.
QUALITY OF TEACHING S55
old age, — but he will not grow perceptibly during all these years, unless it be in his
ability to do his work on a minimal expenditure of effort.
Fortunately for the normal school, this type of teacher is in the minority in its
classrooms. Most of the men and women in the Missouri schools give themselves with-
out reserve to their work. Many of them take the true artist's view, that whatever
one attempts to do must be done just as well as it can be done. Each recitation hour
saps the energy of such teachers and the close of the day finds them limp and ex-
hausted. There is neither time nor strength for the preparation that they should give
to the work of the next day, — not preparation in the narrow sense of reviewing one's
subject-matter for the next assignment, but preparation in the broader sense of search-
ing diligently for new light, of reorganizing and replanning the structure of one's
teaching, of working out new problems and providing illustrations that will appeal
to the class in part, at least, because they are fresh and interesting to the teacher
himself. This preparation, too, should not encroach upon a reasonable margin of
leisure, when the teacher may turn Ms mind away from his work, and seek the diver-
sion of entirely different activities, or when, if he still remains close to his daily task,
he may at least have opportunities to occupy himself with its constructive phases,
making, perhaps, an occasional contribution to its literature. The kind of growth that
the normal schools should stimulate in their teachers cannot be attained upon the
basis of the grueling programs that most normal schools demand at the present time.
SOME FORM OF EDUCATIONAL CRITICISM DESIRABLE
Granted both a more reasonable teaching program and a spirit of cooperation upon
the part of the teacher that will make an interchange of visits possible and profitable,
there is still need in the normal school for something akin to classroom supervision
altho it could hardly be called by this name, since it would be in method and spirit
something quite different from the supervision commonly practised in the elementary
school. Actual supervision and inspection in the narrower sense might, indeed, some-
times be justified in connection with the work of the younger instructors, but the
very qualities that we hope will come to characterize the mature teacher — enthu-
siasm and capacity for continued growth — presuppose the attitude of the master
rather than the attitude of the apprentice, and the self-respect that is inconsistent
with the feeling of subservience when one is made conscious of having a "superior,"
actual or assumed, constantly prying into the details of one"*s work.
AH "EDUCATIONAL ADVISER"
What is needed, then, is not the "inspector" or "supervisor," but a colleague for
critical tho friendly counsel; the term "educational adviser" expresses the desired re-
lationship. Such a person should not be looked upon by the instructors as a superior.
It would be his duty to study the work of the school and to call the instructors into
conference for the general discussion of educational problems; individual criticism
256 ELEMENTS IN THE CURRICULUM
should probably be given only on the invitation of the teacher himself. Where au-
thority is needed to carry thru some desirable reform in the work of the school, it
should be gained by faculty action, and where personal discipline is necessary, the
administrative authority of the school should assume the duty.
It is clear, then, that the functions that we have in mind for the adviser cannot
often be successfully discharged by the president of the school. The president is neces-
sarily in a position of administrative authority and responsibility, and it would be
difficult for him or for the teacher to forget this fact in the essentially cooperative
work contemplated in this proposal. Nor is it in any way derogatory to the normal
school presidents of to-day to say that they have not generally been selected with
reference to their expertness in teaching or their ability to advise helpfully with re-
gard to classroom problems. Other things have been significant in determining the
qualifications of a normal school president — ability to administer the financial affairs
of the school, to meet legislators and win support for appropriations, to make ad-
dresses and otherwise represent the school acceptably before the public. All of these
qualities are important, but they do not always go with the ability to undertake the
delicate task of helping a group of specialized and highly sensitive teachers in the
intimate problems of their daily work.
The right type of person could render an important service in this position of edu-
cational adviser. He could bring to each instructor the pertinent contributions that
his colleagues were making in the solution of similar problems, acting as a sort of
clearing house for teaching experience. He could direct the interchange of visits sug-
gested in a preceding paragraph. He could arrange for conferences and discussions
upon the various phases of teaching. Further than this, he could do much to ensure a
thoroughgoing coordination of all of the courses with a view to the professional goal.
It would be an important part of his business to envisage the training process as a
whole, and to make certain that each unit was fulfilling its function in the work of the
organism. To this end, he should know what account the graduates of the school are
giving of their training, and a part of his time each year should be spent in this fol-
low-up work. To expect each of the instructors to visit the schools where their gradu-
ates are teaching is out of the question, but the educational adviser could visit sys-
tematically and bring back to the instructors detailed reports of the points at which
the training had been defective.
The success of the function above described would depend upon the wisdom, tact,
and sympathetic attitude of the person engaged. Superior workers in every form of
achievement know well the value of candid, intelligent criticism of their productions.
The better work they do, the more they appreciate the judgment of keen observers
who may perhaps be less competent than they in the particular field, but who for the
time being see more elements bearing on the situation than can he who is absorbed in
his production. Add to the qualification of general fitness a professional familiarity
with education as a whole, a tested experience, drawn from many subjects and types
QUALITY OP TEACHING- S57
of activity, of how knowledge and habits best get into students* minds, and our critic
becomes an invaluable asset to the school. Sincere teachers crave such help, and an
acute and well-informed student of education, possessing- the personal gift of winning
confidence, would speedily make himself indispensable as an adviser in a group even
of the best trained minds.
OTHER SOLUTIONS
If it is impracticable to secure the services of such an adviser, much could probably
be done by joint action. A small committee, comprising perhaps three of the strongest
and preferably the older teachers, could be chosen in rotation by the faculty itself to
undertake this work. This plan would have the advantage of ensuring from the out-
set the cooperation of the teachers in the enterprise, and if the teaching programs of
the members of the committee could be reduced in proportion to the time spent in
visitation and consultation, good results would doubtless follow from an adoption of
the plan.
Another possible solution of the problem has been attempted in a few of the normal
schools. The director of the training department is delegated by the president to su-
pervise the instruction of the normal school teachers. This plan will doubtless work
satisfactorily under certain conditions, but as a general procedure it has obvious
defects. The director of the training department is likely to have more than enough
to do in looking after the work of the practice teachers in the training school. Even
if he can spare the time for classroom visitation, the advisability of placing the su-
pervision of the instructors and that of the student- teachers in the same hand is
seriously to be questioned.
The general provisions for self-scrutiny suggested in the preceding paragraphs
should not preclude similar activity within departments. Members of the English staff,
for example, should constitute a committee for the coordination of all English courses.
The tendency of the individual instructor to get into a rut in his teaching can be suc-
cessfully counteracted in no more certain way than by subjecting his material to at
least an annual overhauling under the critical eyes of his colleagues. Normal schools
generally are weak in departmental organization ; the principle of departmental re-
sponsibility which means so much to the initiative and efficiency of the individual
teacher should be much more clearly recognized. With the provisions for the general
supervision and coordination of the class work which have been suggested above, the
dangers that might otherwise inhere In too large a measure of departmental auton-
omy may be greatly reduced.
258 SELECTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF CURRICULA
D. SELECTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF CURRICULA
1. The Present Situation
The object of sound administration of a curriculum for the preparation of teach-
ers, as for any other professional purpose, is to put as many individuals as are needed
in possession of the best available information and skill suited to their purpose with
the smallest reasonable outlay of time and money. Granted an adequate staff and
equipment, and such a selection of courses as shall furnish the "available informa-
tion and skill," the problem is reduced to the creation of such an operating program
as shall utilize staff and equipment most completely to meet the known numerical
requirements of the schools of the state.
RELATIVE USE MADE OF COLLEGIATE INSTRUCTORS
There is no doubt that the teaching staffs of the various schools are at present
worked quite beyond an advisable limit, considering the quality of service they are
expected to perform. This appears plainly in the overburdening of teachers with
classes, as set forth in another section.1 Another phase of the situation, and one merit-
ing equal attention, is the extent to which the work of teachers is being utilized. Cer-
tain inferences on this point may be drawn from an inspection of class membership.2
The proportion of all collegiate classes in which the membership falls below ten
during the regular session in the year cited is thirty-six per cent. Only four depart-
ments show a membership of ten or more in two-thirds of their classes. Ten per cent
of all collegiate classes have from one to four members. Whatever the cause of this,
it is obvious that the schools are at present utilizing far less than half of their avail-
able teaching resources. Thirty is a standard maximum for collegiate classes, where
recitation and discussion methods are followed, as is the case in the great majority
of normal school classes. Laboratory groups may be half this number; lecture sections
need of course be limited only by the size of the room and the number of windows
and ventilators. To spend the efforts of expert teachers on changing groups of five,
eight, or even twelve students is plainly a waste of great seriousness which should be
avoided if possible. The appropriations for preparing teachers are too pitifully small
as it is, to justify indulgence in any unnecessary expenditure.
CAUSES OF WASTE : DUPLICATION OF CLASSES
The reasons for the present conditions are entirely clear. They are mainly three.
In the first place, courses are duplicated from term to term to meet what are deemed
to be the exigencies of normal school attendance. Faithful to early tradition, the
schools have been unwilling to shape their work either for all or for any exclusive
portion of their students in such a way as to require regular and continuous attend-
ance. In its desire for a large enrolment each school has catered to the immediate con-
1 See pag-e 108. 3 See pages 486, 437.
PRESENT SITUATION 259
venience of the student, tho there are probably few students who could not arrange
with careful management to do continuous work, even if at longer intervals.1 A care-
ful examination of the offerings of the schools for 1915—16 shows that, in the regular
session alone, a total of ninety-six, or twelve per cent of all the collegiate classes con-
ducted in that session, apparently duplicated other courses, and could have been
consolidated with similar classes in other terms of the regular session without thereby
creating sections too large for convenient handling. The actual money saving effected
thereby would have amounted to nearly ten thousand dollars. The schools vary con-
siderably among themselves in the extent of this practice; Cape Girardeau has elimi-
nated it almost entirely.
Concrete illustrations are as follows: Kirks ville gives a course in "Farm Machinery1'
to five students in the fall, and again to fourteen in the winter term; "Plant Physi-
ology" to nine in the fall, and again to six in the winter at an extra cost of $145;
"Photography" to eight in the fall, two in the winter, and eight in the spring — an
unnecessary outlay of $S40. Warrensburg provides the " History of Mathematics" for
four students in the fall, and again in the spring for nine at an extra cost of SI 50;
"Principles of Criticism" for seven students, and later for five at the same figure;
"Poultry Raising" for nine, ten, and eleven students, respectively, at a cost of SS£T
instead of $109 for thirty students at one time.
The illustrations above are drawn from collegiate classes only, since these are the
smallest and therefore most expensive. Secondary classes are repeated to a still greater
extent, but with less financial loss, as the classes are generally full. The bad effect in
these cases is the less striking one of arbitrary, incoherent election. Even students
continuously in attendance, instead of taking the course when it would logically do
them the greatest service as an organic development of their curriculum, wait until
it comes around at a convenient hour, or until certain friends take it, or until it may
be given by a certain teacher — a form of "adjustment to the individual" that is
of questionable value,
AN EXTRAVAGANT ELECTIVE SYSTEM
The second reason for multiplying small classes inheres in the unwarranted inter-
pretation of the whole elective system as applied to the training of teachers, and
the notion that being a college, even a teachers college, involves the same varied and
comprehensive educational bill of fare that colleges usually present (too often only in
their catalogues). The merits of this question have been fully set forth and discussed
in another section, where the normal school offerings in each department have been
shown.2 The summary of the collegiate offerings there given furnishes the best of evi-
dence in the present argument.
It will be apparent that in the effort to conduct so varied a program the schools
cannot escape the conditions indicated above. At many points the proposals are
1 See pages 301 ff. * See pages 228 ff. For summary, see table, page 411.
260 SELECTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF CURRICULA
manifestly absurd, as where Cape Girardeau records ninety-one semester hours of
ancient languages to be given by one instructor; such impossible pretensions are
inexcusable and go far to discredit the academic good faith of the institution mak-
ing them. Even considering only what the schools are actually able to offer, all would
have to combine in one institution to make such an elaborated scheme economically
workable, and such an institution exists already in the state university. For the lat-
ter, there is reason in an extended program which involves many small classes, for it
is the one central feeder for a great variety of professions and educational demands;
but the normal school has a single, straightforward aim, and out of a dozen courses
needs but the one course best fitted for its purpose. Moreover, when courses multiply in
such luxuriance, the real good of the student is bound to suffer. A prospective teacher
of high school history could profitably take perhaps thirty hours of history in a four
years course. The history he must have includes elementary courses required also of
those not intending to teach history. If he receives in thirty hours the best possible
preparation for teaching high school history, there is certainly every reason for giv-
ing each student with the same destination as good a preparation. To focus the nor-
mal school teacher's attention on this — the intensive appropriateness of his curricu-
lum for his students' future work — is to 'serve the student and the public; it is also
to use the teacher most economically, for all courses apply then equally to all stu-
dents following the same curriculum. From the point of view of sound professional
education as well as of financial economy, there can hardly be a rational defence for
the existing elective system of the normal school except as the school proposes to
weaken its distinctly teacher-training function and become a "general" college.1
LACK OF INTERCOLLEGIATE DIFFERENTIATION
The third factor that operates to make an economical administration of the cur-
riculum impossible is yet more fundamental than either of the two preceding. The
genius that has presided over the development of the Missouri training agencies
has apparently ignored the far-reaching benefit that would accrue to the state thru
having the institutions of one section serve the people in another; not to speak of the
money saving to be effected thereby. Each school is now as self-contained as tho there
were no other similar institution within the state, and with independent boards,
strong local feeling, and no real interest in the problem on the part of some intelli-
gent central authority, the case could scarcely be otherwise.
Here is the situation. Rural and graded elementary school teachers of all types are
needed in fairly constant numbers in all parts of the state. These it is, of course, the
1 The institution at Cape Girardeau has avowedly taken just this step. It is a principle of the school that there is
no fixed minimum for class membership ; that the teachers will do everything for a single student who desires a
course. We find, therefore, cases like the following:: A twelve weeks class in Caesar, two students, at an expense of
$42 each ; in Ethics, two students, $35 each ; in Analytic Geometry, two students, $36 each; in Bacteriology, two stu-
dents, $64 each ; in Spanish, one student, 5$68 ; while students in classes of reasonable size are receiving: their instruc-
tion from one of the best-paid teachers in the school for $5 or $6 per term. It is noticeable, however, that these smallest
classes, usually the most advanced, do not in general receive the best-paid instruction ; that is too expensive even
for Cape Girardeau,
PRESENT SITUATION 861
primary duty of each normal school,, so far as possible, to supply. As shown elsewhere,
however, the public schools annually draw large numbers of high school teachers of
various subjects, some directly from the elementary grades below them,1 some from the
normal schools, some from the university, and some from outside the state. As more
and more specific training has been made available and necessary for these various
specialized types of secondary instructor, it has been tacitly assumed by the normal
schools and admitted by the state that each institution was to expand its facilities for
all the types of training that any other institution offered. This has been a matter not
of demonstrated need, but strictly of sectional pride; it was felt to be unfair for one
institution to present more, or more varied, courses than another. Thus special equip-
ment has been acquired by all the schools for collegiate work in the industrial arts,
in fine arts, in household arts, and particularly in agriculture. When once these de-
partments have been installed, the way is open for their development to any extent
for which funds can be secured from the legislature, unless a fixed policy of joint
administration is determined upon.
Against any considerable development of these and certain other departments,
however, the economic situation has erected an effective barrier. Students in any num-
bers hesitate to undertake long training for positions as agricultural supervisors, for
example, when there may be fewer than half a dozen such openings in the state each
year; and for the same reason schools scarcely feel at liberty to urge students into
such courses, unless, indeed, as has here and there occurred, they forsake their exclu-
sive purpose of teacher-training and, in order to enlarge the department, throw ii open
to all who for any reason desire to study agriculture. It is safe to say that after the
elementary courses, which may be desirable for all teachers, have been provided, there
is not in all Missouri a demand more than sufficient to exhaust the product of one
good normal school in these various branches ; to maintain five at the present expense
is extravagant and leads to the conditions already noted — few students, small classes,
many omitted courses, partly utilized teachers, and, in general, nerveless and fleshless
departments.
CONCENTRATION OF ADVANCED CURRICULA IN LATIN
For example, teachers of Latin and Greek could be trained far better and certainly
at much less expense if the advanced work in those subjects were given only at Spring-
field, where it is at present best developed. When this department was visited at Kirks-
ville, two classes were found reproducing rural school conditions in that the two stu-
dents in one class recited while the one student in the other was at the blackboard; then
they turned about. At Maryville, of two students enrolled in a Cicero class one had
dropped out; in the Vergil class a single student was preparing to go to the university.
At Cape Girardeau, a class of eight in beginning Greek had been collected. It was said
to be the first Greek class in six years. The next year it had disappeared entirely
1 This source is now nearly closed, owing to rulings of the state department requiring specific preparation.
SELECTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF CURRICULA
and no Greek whatever was taught, with the result that this first year's work was
probably almost a total waste of time to these eight students in so far as their training
at Cape Girardeau as teachers of Greek was concerned.
The total cost of all collegiate1 instruction in Latin and Greek for 1915-16 in the
five schools was $8514. The instructors received an average of $1676 each ; two hun-
dred forty-six collegiate grades were recorded in forty classes averaging six students
each.2 The college work given covered three years at four schools and one-third of a
year at the fifth, Mary ville. Had this work been concentrated in a well-organized three-
year college curriculum at one school, it could have been done in nine classes averaging
twenty-seven students each, and would have required, in the three terms of the reg-
ular session, but one teacher working at a weekly maximum of fifteen hours, instead
of six teachers working twenty, twenty-five, and thirty hours as at present. This
teacher could have been paid $8500 instead of $1676, and could have had the summer
free. Or the same work could have been done in eighteen classes of fourteen students
each, covering the four terms of the year as now; this would have required the time
of one instructor teaching fifteen hours weekly and half the time of another, and they
could have been paid at the rate of $2368 per year.3 In either case the total result
would have been far better aside from the improvement in classes, hours, and salaries.
A department of this kind would have no apologies to make to any college or uni-
versity; it would be a going concern commanding the respect of superintendents
everywhere.
CONCENTRATION OF ALL HIGH SCHOOL CURRICULA
The situation with respect to Latin applies in some degree to practically all high
school subjects. Every teacher needs some history, but a specialist's curriculum in his-
tory need not be provided at each of the five schools* Besides, but few normal-trained
teachers in the state teach high school history alone, and that usually after years of
experience and promotion.4 Schools that prepare high school teachers of history must,
therefore, count on giving preparation in at least two subjects to each candidate. Were
the schools to pool their resources and each accept certain subjects or combinations
of subjects for special emphasis, the need would be well and amply met. On this basis
we would have schools A and B preparing all types of elementary teachers and also
offering fall curricula for high school teachers of history, English, and possibly of
modern languages; while school A might offer in addition an advanced curriculum in
1 Kirksville, Warrensburg, and Maryville rate (1915) as collegiate all instruction in Latin beyond the second year-
Cape Girardeau and Springfield include the third year as secondary work. The latter rating has been followed here.
2 Kirksville, 9 classes, averaging: 5 students; Warrensburg, 9 classes, averaging' 6M students; Cape Girardeau, 11
classes, averaging- 7 students ; Springfield, 10 classes, averaging 5j£ students (omitting two summer teachers' classes
of 36 and 38 students) ; and Maryville, 1 class with 6 students.
s Under present (1916) conditions of teaching load (twenty-five hours) and salary ($1676), such consolidations would
have saved the state over two thousand dollars in the year in this department alone.
* In the inexperienced group of 1915 (159 out of a total including over ninety per cent of all existing positions in the
state at large), only seven of those who taught but one subject came from the normal schools : three women taught
English, two household arts, and two men taught mathematics.
PRESENT SITUATION $62
fine arts and music, and school B similar opportunities in Latin and commercial sub-
jects. Schools C and D5 on the other hand, would give all of the necessary beginning
courses needed for their groups of teachers, but would confine their advanced curricula
to mathematics and science, with a special curriculum in C for agriculture and in D
for household arts. School E could be assigned special curricula in physical training
and in other subjects as they developed. In this way any student would find at some
normal school in the state, or at the university, a curriculum in any desired subject
that could not well be improved upon elsewhere, instead of five impoverished cen-
tres vainly struggling with a weak dilution of everything. More travel might indeed
be necessary for some students who were sure of what they wished to study. For the
majority, however, the program at any one school would present sufficient variety to
allow for personal adjustment on the part of those who might attend from the local
community.
ADVANTAGES OF DIFFERENTIATION
This principle of differentiated effort is the only practicable remedy for the situa-
tion confronting the Missouri schools, and would long since have been applied had
an active central board or single educational authority been in charge to resist local
pressure and enforce a wise coordination. The results accomplished elsewhere, in Mas-
sachusetts, in Wisconsin, and in New York, for example, have been notably success-
ful and worthy of imitation. There is no reason why the normal schools, because they
serve small towns and small schools, should serve them in a small manner. The ser-
vice they render should be respected and acceptable in St. Louis, Kansas City, or any-
where else. If a candidate can take but a two-year curriculum, he should be assured
of obtaining the best as far as he goes. This is plainly impossible now. The very size
of their avowed program confuses the schools. With insufficient demand, insufficient
students, insufficient funds, and insufficient staff to conduct all departments well, they
are bewildered as to what they shall do, lest to develop fully any particular field may
be construed as relinquishing their claim to develop all others with equal success. To
keep up an appearance of expansion, a school is tempted to injure its basic courses;
one school during two recent years sacrificed funds that should have been used for
sorely needed books, to build a greenhouse! All have experiment farms, but fine tho
it is to have them, they serve little organic purpose in the school because the division
of agricultural training among the five schools and the university will not justify or
permit of the proper development of the facilities at any one point. Country life con-
ferences in the fall and short courses (not in teaching) for farmers' boys in the winter
have been inaugurated in connection with such equipment ; both produce a genial
glow in the community, but have actually little to do with preparing the type of
teachers that these schools send out.
These three causes — duplicated courses du-e to unregulated attendance, parallel
courses needlessly multiplied out of deference to the elective idea, and specialized
SELECTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF CURRICULA
courses taken by a few students only but kept going for the sake of presenting an
unbroken front to students and competitors — are chiefly responsible for the weak-
ness of the present administrative system as it concerns the curricula. They are the
natural results of efforts on the part of vigorous and aggressive schools, without
losing touch with their public, to embark on all forms of varied modern training
for the teaching profession, and to do so independently because neither the tradition
nor, until recently, the absolute need for cooperation has existed. The ambitions to
this end are praiseworthy in the highest degree, but in their present form or in any
conceivable form which present conditions would permit, the efforts to work them
out must inevitably be disappointing or disastrous.
EFFECT OF THE PRESENT POLICIES UPON THE BASIC WO&K OF THE INSTITUTIONS
The effect of the present policy in lowering standards and wasting money has
been made clear in the case of the advanced courses, but the policy is one that cuts both
ways. Funds with which to expand the curricula at the top must often be taken
from courses at the bottom, and to see that this has been done, one has only to note
the size of classes at the large end of the scale.1 It has been stated that for the usual
discussion class in the normal school, thirty members is a maximum consistent with
good teaching. During the regular winter session of 1915-16, twelve per cent (fifteen
per cent at Springfield) of the classes in collegiate work exceeded this figure, but the
proportion rose in summer to thirty-six per cent (forty-six per cent at Kirksville).
These excesses are chiefly, of course, in the elementary classes of the first collegiate
year where students fresh from high school are receiving their first professional train-
ing. The following teachers' programs from three schools illustrate the conditions :
SPBINGFIEUD CAPE GIRARDEAU KIRKSVTLLE
cr»,7,^«-f Number of <?„,>>„*„„+ Number of o«*>'« * Number of
Subject Students Subject students Subject Students
Psychology 54 Psychology 70 Psychology 71
Psychology 44 Psychology 54 Psychology 31
Educational Psychology 33 Psychology 68 Educational Psychology 37
Educational Psychology 32 Psychology 47 History of Education 77
Educational Psychology 39 Child Study 46 History of Education 45
Sociology 16
Average Class 36 Average Class 57 Average Class 52
To term the work done in these large groups "collegiate"" may not at first appear
to be a misnomer, except in so far as overburdened teachers are concerned.2 Some col-
leges using the lecture, test, and examination method have equally large classes with-
out seriously ill effect. This method is, however, expressly disclaimed at the normal
schools; these are "recitation "classes in every case, as classes at this stage of prof es-
1 See page 4S6.
2 The instructor at Cape Girardeau did his work in fifteen hours per week ; but the other two taught, one twenty-five
and one thirty hours.
CURRICULA NEEDED IN MISSOURI 265
sional training should clearly be. To expect any teacher to conduct on this plan and
without assistance five classes daily, numbering as many students as these do, and that
in a period of excessive heat, is to expect the impossible. The work attempted by
these three men, if properly handled, would have required the full time of six in-
structors, even allowing slightly over eighteen hours of work per week, as a conces-
sion in view of the numerous repetitions involved. The obligation to furnish com-
petent instruction to this extent should have been met, or else the applications
should have been refused. Good administration means this. Instead of creating a staff
suitable for the work actually in hand, however, the expansion of collegiate elec-
tives as a first consideration has absorbed all of the money that could possibly be
extracted.
The same situation appears among the secondary classes with, if possible, still worse
excuse. Students less mature than their collegiate colleagues, with weaker initiative
and less adaptability to the difficulties of the large class, have actually done their work
in the normal schools under conditions that a good high school would not tolerate,
Sixty in a grammar class and forty-nine in rhetoric at Cape G-irardeau; fifty -six in
American history, fifty -two in physiography at \Varrensburg; rural school methods
for eighty at Kirksville from a teacher with five daily classes averaging fifty-six each;
seventy-two in rural teaching at Mary vi lie, one of the teacher's four daily classes ; —
these are monstrosities of which no good institution should be guilty. Between their
small classes in the regular session and their large classes in the summer session the
schools waver between illogical and hurtful extremes that argue a desire to exploit
their respective opportunities rather than to hold consistently to good educational
principles.
2. Number and Kind of Curricula needed in Missouri
The selection and management of professional curricula cannot proceed intelli-
gently without a fairly exact knowledge of the dimensions of the problem to be
solved. With proper organization, accurate reports from every teaching position in
the state can easily be secured by a state department and worked up year by year
into a clear picture of what the agencies for the preparation of teachers have before
them. This is more difficult for an outside agency asking for unwonted reports that
represent at best only a cross section of the state at a single moment. The returns
filed with the Foundation are so extensive, however, that they admit of an approx-
imation to the actual conditions sufficiently close to serve at least the purposes of
illustration. They are briefly summarized here not for their absolute value, but to
indicate in outline the information which, in much more complete form, should be
constantly before the central authority having the preparation of the state's teach-
ers in charge.
£66 SELECTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF CURRICULA
TEACHERS IN RURAL SCHOOLS
So far as can be discovered, there were In 1914-15 in Missouri ten thousand five
hundred fifteen1 teaching positions in one-room schools or in rooms containing more
than three grades of children. Of different white teachers holding these positions in
the spring or fall of 1915, replies were secured from eight thousand two hundred sev-
enty-seven, and on their replies the following statements are based.2
Thirty-six per cent of the teachers were in positions held by them the previous year;
forty per cent were teachers with experience in at least one other school, who were
new to their positions that year; and twenty-four per cent were wholly inexperienced,
Hence, if this group is typical, about twenty-four hundred new teachers are needed
annually in Missouri to supply the rural schools alone.
The present deficiency in training is best seen in a brief analysis of this inexpe-
rienced group. It is represented by eleven hundred fifty-two teachers, or twenty-
four per cent of those replying on the institute blank.3 Leaving out those who failed
to state their training,4 only seventeen per cent report any work of a collegiate charac-
ter in addition to a secondary course — usually a year or less in some normal school;
all the rest are a secondary product exclusively. Nearly three-fifths come from high
schools where twenty-four per cent received less than four years of instruction.5
Thirteen per cent received a part, and nine per cent all, of what secondary training
they may have had, in normal schools. Four per cent had no training above the ele-
mentary school.
Another distribution of essentially the same facts appears in the array of certifi-
cates under which this annual army of recruits goes forth. The dependence placed by
the state on its third grade county certificate, recently made available for eight years
instead of four,6 is shown in the fact that nearly half — forty-seven per cent — of
the new rural teachers have nothing else. Twenty per cent hold the second grade
county certificate, while but two per cent hold the first grade county or any form of
state certificate. Eighteen per cent hold the high school training-class license, and
from normal schools seven per cent hold the rural certificate and five per cent the
thirty-hour certificate; one per cent hold a diploma.
With liberal allowance for schooling from all sources, it is clear that a large ma-
jority of this great number who undertake for the first time to teach schools in the
rural communities of Missouri are unfit to be entrusted with such a task even ac-
cording to present low standards of qualification.
1 This number includes about five per cent estimated to be positions for teachers of more than three grades in graded
schools, inasmuch as five per cent of the 8277 replies were of this character. Of "country" schools, as understood
by the state department, there seem to have been 9990.
2 See note 3, page 361. The statements in this section follow the second group of returns.
3 See note 3, page 361.
* Two per cent.
5 About one-third of these attended only one year or less.
c See page 305, note.
CURRICULA NEEDED IN MISSOURI 267
TEACHERS IN GRADED ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS
Elementary teachers in graded schools have been considered in three groups : those
in St. Louis, those in Kansas City, and those in the state at large. The total n am-
bers of white elementary teachers in these groups are 1789? 779, and 3650, x respec-
tively. The corresponding proportion of response to enquiries was eighty-seven -per
cent, ninety-five per cent, and sixty-four per cent.
The number of teachers reporting themselves as new to their work in St. Louis and
Kansas City is, for no apparent reason, extraordinarily small, — two and three per
cent. This proportion does not conform to the facts, and may be due to the incli-
nation of freshly appointed teachers to regard their earlier apprenticeship in these
systems as equivalent to experience. In the remainder of the state the proportion of
change is nearly one-third, as compared with almost two-thirds in the rural group,
altho but twelve per cent are fresh accessions and still fewer, nine per cent, are wholly
inexperienced. If these proportions are typical, the average teaching life of a teacher
in the graded schools of Missouri is about eleven years, and the state at large, outside
of St. Louis and Kansas City, requires for annual replacement about three hundred
thirty freshly prepared teachers. It is possible that voluntary replies, such as these
were, represent most largely the experienced teachers. The uncertainty of interpre-
tation at such an important point as this shows the necessity of requiring a complete
inventory of teaching personnel if the problem of supply is to be handled intelli-
gently.
While it is now the exception for St. Louis and Kansas City to employ new teachers
without two or more years of collegiate preparation, the remainder of the state is
satisfied that half of its new teachers should come directly from secondary study, that
one-sixth of them should have taken but a partial high school course, and that only
one-fourth of them should have as much as two years of professional training. The
great majority of new workers pass first into the intermediate grades and are then
presumably " promoted" in either direction. Fifty- six per cent of those outside of
the two large cities are obliged to teach more than one grade.
TEACHERS IN HIGH SCHOOLS
Among the classified high school teachers of the state,2 ninety-two per cent in all
and a still larger proportion of teachers in first class schools responded to the en-
quiries made of them ; at St. Louis ninety-six per cent, and at Kansas City ninety-
eight per cent replied. This group of instructors is therefore well represented.
The proportion of change in the group is astonishing. Omitting the two largest
cities, nearly half — forty- six — out of every hundred teachers in classified high schools
were new to their positions in 1915. Twenty-one of these forty-six were experienced
teachers from other schools, in most cases within the state; twenty-five, however, were
1 In the state at large principals are included among the teachers, as they chiefly are such.
2 Including principals.
268 SELECTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF CURRICULA
new : ten of them resuming teaching after an interruption, perhaps for study, and
fifteen being wholly untried. The two great cities admit but a negligible proportion of
inexperienced teachers into their high schools: St. Louis, one per cent; Kansas City,
three per cent. Consequently in so far as teachers for these systems are drawn from
within the state, they must get their experience in the smaller centres. If fifteen per
cent of the total number of positions is the total number of new teachers required,
these would number in 1914-15 about one hundred seventy-five.
The present preparation of this inexperienced group, as shown in the records of
one hundred fifty -nine teachers reporting from classified high schools, is all but three
per cent in advance of secondary work. Nine-tenths have had more than one year of
collegiate work; two-thirds of them have had over two years; and fifty-five per cent
have had four years or more. Slightly over one-third ever attended a normal school.
As to subjects taught on first appointment, one-fourth of the number were at work
in a single field; with five exceptions these were in first class schools. Forty-six per
cent taught a combination of two subjects, and the remainder taught three or, in
three cases, four subjects. For men, science stands first in frequency, followed by math-
ematics, commercial subjects, manual training, and drawing; for women, English is
far in advance, with household arts, commercial subjects, mathematics, history, sci-
ence, and Latin following in the order named. No other subject was taught exclu-
sively by more than one of these new teachers. Leading combinations of two or more
subjects are combinations of the above, with the addition of agriculture and history
for men and German for women.
HOW SHALL THIS NEED BE MET?
To sum up the situation thus briefly reviewed and to suggest adjustments of the
existing facilities to meet it is an undertaking that can be attempted only in broadest
outline in view of the meagre information at hand; it is properly a matter for close
and continuous study based upon the accumulation of accurate figures covering sev-
eral years. These do not exist in Missouri at present, hence the element of annual
increase or decrease in the number of new teachers required has necessarily been dis-
regarded, altho it is the essential variable to be reckoned with in the administration
of a permanent policy. With appropriate data it can be forecast very accurately.
The crying need of the state is plainly among its rural schools. Twenty-four
hundred new teachers are required annually. In 1915—16, one hundred three training
classes in high schools graduated seven hundred seventy-four teachers, of whom per-
haps two-thirds, or five hundred eleven, went into rural schools.1 Judging from the
group of teachers new in 1915, the normal schools may be depended on to reach
twenty-two per cent, or five hundred twenty-eight, with some sort of secondary train-
ing, while the normal schools and colleges give some collegiate work to over four
1 The State Report for the preceding: year, 1915, page 91, gives 65 per cent as the proportion of the graduates in 1915
who taught in rural schools; no quotation appears in the Report for 1916.
CURRICULA NEEDED IN MISSOURI 269
hundred more, tho little of all this training is at present suited to the needs of the
rural teacher. These three groups together make a total of fourteen hundred thirty-
nine teachers in contact with some professional training centre. Nine hundred sixty-
one are left for whom provision must be made. To treble the number BOW graduated
from the training classes would supply these. Certainly an average of fifteen usable
teachers from each of one hundred training classes is no very difficult achievement
if undertaken seriously.
The general direction that provision for these teachers must take seems plain.
The personal interests of those who desire to maintain a cheap and handy employ-
ment for their daughters at the expense of the welfare of the whole population,
should give way. The rural districts can have what they wish, but are damaging
their own future by their short-sighted refusal to legislate wisely on the matter of
certificates. The state superintendent should be given power to abolish the third
grade certificate except in counties where in his judgment the training facilities are
inadequate for a better grade of teacher. The membership in training classes should
be increased from an average of eight to an average of from fifteen to twenty by in-
creasing salaries and by the refusal of a rural school license to any new teacher not
possessed of a training-class certificate, or its equivalent from a normal school. Train-
ing-class certificates should, of course, be limited strictly to rural schools, thereby
making the whole class annually available for this service.
To increase the size of training classes is but a temporary expedient, however. Mis-
souri should at once foresee the time when aH rural teachers shall be prepared at com-
petent institutions and be ensured as good a preparation as that given a teacher in
a city school. The normal schools will eventually be obliged to take over this work,
and they can do it if they have the support of suitable legislation. Secondary stu-
dents should presently be turned back to the high school, thus sacrificing the twenty-
two per cent who have been teaching on the strength of this wholly Insufficient prepa-
ration. To make up for these, students who complete but one collegiate year should
be licensed to teach in rural schools only, and the courses required for all such licenses
should be concentrated on the problems of rural school teaching. The training should
be distinctly better than that which is possible in a high school training class, and
graduates should be granted better certificates and should command larger salaries.
The schools should do their utmost to make these one-year curricula attractive.
Courses not leading to rural school work should be found only in longer curricula,
and students taking these should receive a certificate to teach only on their com-
pletion.
The median salary of all rural teachers who have attended a normal school is fifty
dollars per month, as compared with forty-five dollars in the group as a whole; twenty-
seven per cent receive over fifty dollars. To secure an adequate number of teachers at
the new standard and under present conditions, a rising minimum salary established
by law must keep pace with the increasing requirements. To suggest what these
270 SELECTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF CURRICULA
minima should be is not easy, and involves a hazardous compromise with a much
exaggerated "practical situation." It may be said, however, that Missouri would meet,
fairly and none too quickly, the most important obligation of any sort now facing
her, if within three years every teacher in a rural school were receiving at least one
thousand dollars, and within five years at least fifteen hundred dollars a year. For a
wealthy state like Missouri this increase is insignificant when compared with the vital
importance of what it will purchase.
The new teachers needed annually in graded elementary schools outside of St.
Louis and Kansas City numbered three hundred thirty, according to the estimate
derived above. This would require sixty-six two-year graduates annually from each
of the five normal schools — a number certainly well within the facilities of these
schools to provide, assuming that the economic and legislative situation were such as
to supply them with students. There must be sufficient salary inducement to attract
students and a regulation that will hold them to their curricula. As suggested else-
where, centres of more than five thousand inhabitants should not be permitted to
employ new teachers having less than two years of professional preparation, and as
soon as possible the same rule should be made universal. With a regulated qualifi-
cation the salaries would necessarily rise with the demand, and the supply would soon
follow.
The group beginning work in classified high schools was found to number about
one hundred seventy-five. Of these the university, either alone or with the help of
other colleges, prepared thirty-six per cent, and could easily prepare many more
were the positions in Missouri high schools sufficiently attractive financially to allow
it. Fourteen per cent came from other academic institutions within the state9 and a
somewhat larger number came from without. A second thirty-five per cent had at-
tended the state normal schools; often in addition to other institutions. Divided
among five schools, this latter number gives twelve to each, which again subdivided
among the many different departments at each school reduces the present scheme
to an absurdity.1 As pointed out earlier in this section, the only rational treatment
of this situation is to differentiate the work done by the various schools and build
up good curricula for training high school teachers at single schools only instead of
scattering the efforts among six.
In dealing as above with the inexperienced group of elementary and secondary
teachers, it should not be overlooked that these are but a part of the present prob-
lem of the normal schools. The schools have continually and properly sought to tempt
teachers in service to return and improve their preparation. Assuming that all of the
experienced "reentrants" among the accessions of 1915 to the elementary group had
been in normal schools, this would raise their responsibility from three hundred thirty
to four hundred thirty-eight. Similarly, by adding the experienced reentrants, the
1 Altho reports were received from more unclassified schools than were listed by the state department, only seven
new teachers were discovered, five of them prepared by normal schools ; ten were experienced "reentrants," mak-
ing a total accession group of seventeen.
CURRICULA NEEDED IN MISSOURI 271
total of the secondary group would rise from one hundred seventy-five to two hun-
dred ninety-one, of which the normal school's proportion would be thirty-five per
cent or one hundred two, about twenty to each school. These increases leave the sit-
uation wholly unchanged. The normal schools may always be called upon, especially
in vacation sessions, to provide advanced instruction for experienced students who
have already completed their basic preparation. Such subsidiary activities, however,
altho important, should not be permitted to interfere with the development of system-
atic curricula for the sufficient initial training of students entering the profession.
This is at present the fundamental duty of these institutions.
VIII
OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
THE following chapter is devoted, except for occasional references, exclusively to the
state normal schools. It should not be inferred from this that the city training schools
have no problems of administration that merit discussion. The fact is, however, that
the training school of the type of Harris Teachers College at St. Louis either never
encounters such problems as the independent state school has to meet, or else has
already achieved a working solution of them. This is due to the very nature of its
situation. Such a school has originated out of specific needs, precisely measured and
understood; it operates in full view of the conditions that are constantly pressing,
and relentlessly testing its success or failure; it is a constituent part of the organ-
ization that it serves, hence its aims are concrete and direct, lost motion and waste-
ful projects are eliminated, personal vagaries are corrected, and its apparatus is ad-
justed to a relatively high tension of smooth and profitable performance.
The state schools are not yet so fortunate. They were established in response to
urgent but vaguely defined demands assuming promiscuous forms ; themselves located
in small, often remote, communities, they are at a distance from most of the schools
that they are expected to benefit, and have infrequent communication with the teach-
ers they prepare or with their supervisors ; as they are independent and formally irre-
sponsible, no one effectually criticises or calls them to account; the way is therefore
open to what is frequently erratic and capricious development, heedless of the clear
necessities of the field ; and ambiguous aims and a relaxed procedure are difficult to
avoid. As is shown elsewhere,1 weaknesses such as these are inevitable under present
conditions, but can be readily overcome by better organization — an organization
whereby the public schools of the state and the institutions that provide them with
teachers may be brought into successful and economical working relations not unlike
those that prevail in a good city system, while preserving the many advantages of a
freer and more wholesome environment.
A. PRESIDENT AND STAFF
The administration of each normal school is vested in an officer, called a president,
who is elected by the board of regents of that school for a period usually of two
years at the meeting following the biennial reorganization, when the two newly ap-
pointed members of the board take their seats. This officer in turn nominates instruc-
tors and assistants for election by the board for one year (two years at Cape Girar-
deau). The teachers are loosely grouped into "departments;" such departments as
are sufficiently large have some informally recognized head, but except in a few minor
matters, each individual takes his official directions solely from the president.
1 See Chapter IV.
THE PRESIDENT
1. The President
In respect to his powers and duties the president appears to represent the tradi-
tions of the earlier secondary academy or small private college rather than the mod-
ern higher institution of size corresponding to the normal school. Except at War-
rensburg, and very recently at Kirksville, his domination is absolute. In the matter
of appointment, promotion, and dismissal of instructors he is subject to the will of
his board; but in regulating the minutest internal affairs he is supreme. From the
prices at which a student's used textbooks shall be redeemed to the courses of study
and general educational policy of the school, he is sole arbiter. He consults his faculty
on many matters, but is never bound by their action, if indeed any action results from
their deliberation. He establishes the value of credentials and allowances of advanced
standing, determines and referees resident credit, makes and revises students"1 pro-
grams ; he looks after the advertising and financial interests of the institution, deals
with the board of regents, and labors with the legislature. In short, the normal school
president is the school; remove him and the school has no policy; convert him and at
once all that is publicly vocal in the institution changes front. He speaks invariably
with an impressive collective "we,"" but he signifies almost exclusively himself.
MODERN CONCEPTION OF A PRESIDENT'S DUTIES
It is true, of course, that most collegiate institutions in America are the outgrowth
of a somewhat similar theory regarding the function and responsibility of the pres-
ident. By progressive, if tacit, delegations of power, however, and by a more and more
complete enlistment of faculty cooperation, the first class college long since passed
the level on which it is apparently still possible for a normal school to operate. Not
to speak of the trivial items easily handed over to a responsible janitor or assistant,
all routine contact with the individual student, such as registration and classification,
the checking of credentials, the qualification of students for graduation, and so forth,
has found its way into the hands of registrars, faculty officers, or committees who thru
continued experience quickly become expert in a single aspect of administration.
Two fundamental considerations justify this arrangement. As educational institu-
tions have become larger and more complex, the mass of intersecting relations has
made it imperative that the guiding mind be set free for close, detached study of the
principles that govern all this and other institutional procedure; that time be pro-
vided for abundant outside observation, comparison, and reflection ; and that he be
so lifted above detail as to serve steadily, without waste or hurry, his main function
to be the inspiring power and illuminating interpreter behind the whole organ-
ization. Another reason has been no less potent. A skilful and sincere administrator
operates thru principles, and removes himself as far as possible from personal inter-
ference with the concrete case. He constantly seeks to refine and correct the principles
in the interests of justice and the purpose involved, but he devises the system that
requires him to turn his own son over to a faculty committee for impartial treatment
274 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
rather than risk the chance or charge of favoritism in personal relations with students.
He stands for something that may not be thus endangered, and the fact that petty
difficulties of students may be authoritatively threshed out with subordinates who
have usually greater technical skill and far less occasion for partisanship adds greatly
to Ms own influence in larger matters.
The curriculum with its related problems is another field that is no longer the
closed preserve of the modern college president. While the several departments are
allowed great latitude as to the character of the courses that they offer, the curricu-
lum as a whole, the relation of its parts, the allowable combinations of subjects and se-
quence, are matters that are determined after prolonged and thorough faculty discus-
sion, usually after the prior efforts of a select committee; and the action of the faculty
in the matter is final. Naturally, the influence of the president in all this is impor-
tant, and should be so, for the study of such problems is his special business; but a
good faculty contains judgment equal or superior to his on almost any single point,
and it is considered the height of administrative unwisdom to risk arbitrary action
in matters that should come thru cooperative conclusion, even tho they come thus
more slowly.
FUNCTION OF THE PRESIDENT IN THE MISSOURI NORMAL SCHOOLS
The Missouri normal schools, with certain exceptions,1 are an interesting study in
the respects just noted. Administrative perspective is largely lacking; all powers, great
and small, radiate directly from the presidents. In one, the president runs the book-
store, revises the registration of every student, and superintends directly the outlay
of each penny; in another, the president registers every student in so far as this is
physically possible. In the summer enrolment he is obliged to ask assistance. He has
recently arranged for aid in checking up each student's record for graduation, but
passes finally on each himself, often reversing or modifying the conclusions of his
assistant. Tho the state has installed an adequate accounting system in each school,
and provided a man to run it, this president keeps a detailed account of his own as
before. The institution registers over two thousand students each year and has an
annual budget of $80,000. At a third school the credit records of all graduates for
the decade or more that the enquirers studied were laboriously worked out in the
handwriting of the head of the institution. Administration of this type can have but
one result : the guiding officials impress one as constantly immersed in endless affairs
of surprising littleness; the schools seem truncated, lacking clear, fresh, and compre-
hensive thinking at the top.
The curriculum is originated and developed in the same way except at Warrens-
1 At Warrensburg, the whole matter of registration, credentials, and graduation has for many years been in charge
of committees and a competent dean clothed with the necessary authority. At Kirksville, just as this study was
begun in 1914, the administration of credentials and graduation credit was assumed, on request of the students,
by a committee elected by the faculty. At Cape Girardeau, the head of the school, tho less burdened with the cler-
ical task than elsewhere, retains all the authority.
THE PRESIDENT ' £75
burg. Most matters of importance are doubtless discussed in the teachers' meetings,
but the proposals of the president prevail or are withheld. At Mary ville and Spring-
field these meetings leave no trace, not even minutes, the proceedings being of the
high school type — "inspiration" or instructions. Since 1914 the Kirksville staff has
preserved minutes, as is done also at Cape Girardeau, but the teachers have no im-
portant power in either school. At Warrensburg, on the contrary, faculty participa-
tion in the determination of the curriculum and credits has existed for more than
a decade, and with rare exceptions faculty decisions have been final. A careful record
is a matter of course.
EFFECTS OF THE PRESIDENT'S PREROGATIVE ON THE SCHOOL
The consequences of the situation just described are important. The headship of
a normal school is an almost unlimited personal challenge. Each incumbent desires to
succeed. Under present conditions the measure of success is chiefly the size and promi-
nence of the institution ; there exists no audit or accounting of the factors governing
its inner worth, no check whatsoever on the part of an outside agency in the interest
of the state. In the struggle for success, therefore, where every tool is available, it lies
solely with a leader's vision and conscience whether he will promote his institution
on principles rigorously justifiable educationally, or whether he will manipulate each
lever to serve immediate ends ; whether he will have the insight to achieve solid growth,
or will seek merely to "swell1"'
The temptation is unfair and well-nigh irresistible. Here, for example, is a new in-
stitution set to make its way in a well-disposed community; it needs friends, — active
influences to bring in students. What could be more to the point than to gather in
promising teachers of the region, give them a few courses, and send them out glowing
with unearned and unexpected degrees to boom the school? Their only credential is
that the president thought they "deserved" it. Such a proposal, if put before a self-
respecting faculty, would undoubtedly be rejected. One reads with comparative ap-
preciation the first report of the first president at another school; "None of these
[students] were sufficiently advanced to enter a graduating class, but a few of them
are now successfully teaching, while the most of them are still pursuing their studies."1
Unwarranted use of the presidential prerogative has run like a yellow strand thru the
otherwise largely admirable service of some of these men. Appears an attractive ap-
plicant— a person mentally or physically plausible who will advertise the school —
and mere "requirements'" are suddenly dissolved in order to fit his situation, credit is
meted out to serve his need, and one more indebted influence is attached to the adminis-
tration; while some docile girl may weep long on her successive returns after intervals
of teaching, at the steadily harder bargain that is driven with her in the interests of
"higher standards."" The apparently well-substantiated charge of calculated favor-
itism pursued some of these gentlemen even from their otherwise loyal supporters.
1 State Report, 1874, page 60.
£76 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
So likewise with the curriculum. An ambitious president has it in his power to in-
flate his two-year program to a four-year curriculum solely on paper, and to publish
it widely in his bulletins. To substantiate the offering, he accepts credits from local
college graduates who, for the sake of some professional courses of sophomore grade,
will consent to be decorated with an additional A.B. degree. These brilliant examples
infect other local products until by dint of much persuasion, " teaching scholarships,""
summer faculty appointments, and other devices, a "four-year class" is achieved.
Whatever the merits of a four-year curriculum in the given school may eventually
prove to be, nothing could be clearer than that such a group of students is marshaled
at the outset not for their own good, — for they would be far better off elsewhere, —
but solely to create prestige.
PERSONAL PREROGATIVE SHOULD BE LIMITED
It is sufficiently obvious that the growth of an important educational institution,
on which a state is relying for a just recognition and satisfaction of its needs for ade-
quately prepared teachers, should not depend upon the action of one man, whose mo-
tive may range from a prophetic insight to sheer self-seeking caprice. If the school
must be wholly autonomous, and if it is to have a faculty worthy of being an instru-
ment of higher education at all, then let the older and more experienced members of
the faculty be made jointly responsible with the president for the gradual and sane
educational development of the whole. Let at least the internal affairs of the school
be conducted on the basis of complete publicity by disinterested subordinate assist-
ants and in accordance with principles thoroughly discussed, understood, and ap-
proved by all.
But in a state where six institutions share the aforesaid trust, each doing similar
work, often for the same territory, the principle of institutional autonomy is wrong.
In the heads of these six institutions the state possesses a group of informed and
experienced men whose joint action, taken after long and thorough consideration of
all phases of a problem, would undoubtedly be much superior to the isolated judg-
ment of any one of them. To such a group the state could assign the education of
its teachers with more assurance certainly than it may now properly feel. The faculties
should not be ignored in this. Deliberations in the several schools, either by way of
initiative or on reference from a central board of presidents, would furnish a guar-
antee that necessary reforms would not long fail of proposal, and that all proposals
would receive mature study.
3. The Staff
The personnel of the normal school staff has already been described;1 it remains to
set forth the relations of its members to the working organization of the institutions.
From what has just been said regarding the powers of the president it will be
1 See page 99.
THE STAFF £77
clear that the term "staff" is used advisedly; the instructors in the Missouri normal
schools, as at present conducted, do not properly constitute a "faculty." Their rela-
tions to the administration are the same as in the average high school or in private,
proprietary institutions. They are hired for a specific, limited purpose, and tho they
are expected to cooperate in a general way for the good of the institution, and do
so, they are under the immediate and complete direction of the head of the insti-
tution. Appointment is not in any sense an admission into a select and homogeneous
group of scholars jointly responsible for a high educational enterprise. The terms
"professor," "associate professor," and so forth, do indeed appear in certain of the
catalogues, implying a genuine ranking of the teachers, but they are meaningless ex-
cept as arbitrary distinctions indicating a possible difference in salary, and are attached
in imitation of the collegiate practice. One president made a great point of the "de-
mocracy " of his " faculty" meetings in that all instructors were admitted on an equal
footing — an equality rather without significance inasmuch as, apart from certain
details recently wrung from an unwilling administration, the "faculty " had no power.
It should not be inferred that such a group is passive: on the contrary, the amount
of group and committee action is large, but it is always under the personal direction
of the president and concerns merely the course of minor school affairs.1
LARGE DEPARTMENTAL INITIATIVE
In the conduct of his own department, on the other hand, the individual instructor
has been allowed large freedom of initiative. The duties of examining candidates for
admission and of validating claims for advanced standing were regularly referred to the
departments involved, until certification was introduced. As these claims were constant
with the short-term student body, each teacher assumed a two-fold responsibility: one
for the instruction that he gave, and another for the character of the students that he
admitted to his classes. Controlling thus the granting of credit in his own field, and
lacking serious supervision from above, he achieved a considerable autonomy of action.
As long as the course of study remained fixed, and students came to the teacher in
normal distribution among the departments, this worked well. Each teacher reflected
fairly, with but little variation in standards, the general level of the school as a whole.
EFFECTS OF THE ELECTIVE SYSTEM ON THE TEACHES,
The development of the elective system changed this. As worked out in Missouri
this scheme of curriculum organization makes the student the measure of the teacher
in a sense difficult to justify. Instead of a group of students working systematically
thru an orderly plan of training to a definite goal with minds on the content of their
subjects, the instructor faces a class composed of individuals who have selected him
out of several possible choices that would advance them equally toward their diploma,
1 As has been previously noted, the teaching body at Warrensburg appears to have larger powers in some respects
than is the case in the other institutions.
£78 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
He knows that In many cases it is solely his reputation with previous classes that has
brought them there; he knows that unless that reputation is maintained, that unless
his course can be given a savor of modernity surpassing those of his competitors9 or
unless some other tangible inducement can be offered, his numbers will ebb away to
the bare list of those whom circumstances compel to elect his work. The immediate
pressure of this fate is felt thru its effect on the purse. Not that one's salary will be
reduced or his resignation requested, unless the condition continues. But just as an
increase in total enrolment is expected to weigh heavily with the legislators in increas-
ing the biennial appropriations, so it is claimed that the size of individual depart-
ments operates directly with the boards of regents in halting or advancing the in-
dividual salaries in the schools. Not only one^s salary but one's assistants, equipment,
class accommodations, and indirectly one's prestige depend on the same factor. This
general charge was repeated so often in practically all of the schools, and with such
forceful detail, that a visitor could not but be impressed. The lay members of the
boards have naturally little else to go by once they discard a president's judgment as
sole criterion, and under certain conditions even a president may be partial to a teacher
who can attract and hold large numbers.
In such a situation each teacher is faced, as is the president in his larger problem,
by a struggle with his conscience as to what is educationally sincere and honest. Many
teachers have undoubtedly kept their professional standards high.1 But in case one is
not particular, the first move is to get as much of one's work as possible "required," or
if the work is of a nature to make that impossible, it is important to see that as little
of other teachers' work as possible is so protected. If faculty discussion and votes will
bring this about, a formidable contest may occur periodically, each member lining
up in as mechanical a fashion as in any political machine, while the interests of the
student in the point at issue disappear completely.2 If courses cannot be got on the
"required" list, strategy must be used to make them appeal directly. The first step
to this end is to admit every one without prerequisite. In the announcements for 1914—
15, when this study was begun, genuine prerequisites for any but mathematical and
language courses scarcely existed. A member of what is perhaps the strongest depart-
ment of history in all the schools was asked : " Does your department offer any course
in the four-year college curriculum to which you would not admit a 'good husky
lad9 who is mature and well along in his secondary work?" He replied with a decided
1 One head of an important department, one of the best trained and most skilful teachers in the state, was found to
be leaving because her work had no outlook. She had insisted rigorously on the sequence of elementary and advanced
courses with students who came to her, whereas other departments admitted them haphazard; her advanced classes
were therefore always comparatively small and her position seemed permanently restricted as to recognition and
salary.
2 This situation was attested by experiences of members. of the enquiry staff at faculty meetings in two schools. In
one it was a question of the " outs " reducing the work required in the departments of the " ins " —English and Edu-
cation—on the ground that the elective departments thus had too little "show.*' There was considerable feeling1,
and the votes of the two sides were delivered in a wholly cut-and-dried manner. In the other case the aged and re-
spected head of the Latin department arose, and with tears declared that other teachers had been discouraging: elec-
tion in his department, that it was neither fair nor honorable. Certain disclaimers followed. In neither case was there
the remotest reference to the real issue — the actual or probable needs of the student.
THE STAFF 279
negative. Not only are courses themselves thus leveled, but parts of courses, which
according to any, theory of good teaching should be taken in sequence, are thrown
open to free election whenever it may suit the convenience of the student. Thus
second or third term English, history, physics, chemistry, geography, and agriculture
may find half of the class consisting not merely of students who have had the pre-
ceding work in an earlier year, but of complete novices ; or a first term class may
contain several who have already had the second or third term. Another device is
to keep repeating term after term courses that should properly be given but once
during the year; this makes the offering of a department seem large, even tho classes
are small, and gathers in a few extra students, who otherwise might not attend.
It will be readily understood that under such conditions an instructor is not likely
to be too discriminating in his treatment of students. Reinforcing his desire for a large
department is the very laudable wish to help belated boys and girls who have had few
advantages, or to assist others who " must get thru " because of lack of funds or in order
to take a certain desirable position. These considerations are, of course, the only ones
that ever become public. Hence arises the temptation to allow credit for merely nomi-
nal work : a student claims to have done this or that under the direction of the rural
school teacher in his vicinity, and without real examination is allowed credit, particu-
larly after reading an extra book or two, or writing a "paper;" written work done for
another course or in another school, and already credited there, may occasionally be
allowed to count; when but one or two register in a class, whole courses may be credited
on the basis of work done chiefly in private and with every possibility of excessive
credit. Where each item of credit is important in making up the main account, it is not
surprising that a student goes where he can get it most easily, and the teacher who is
most liberal becomes perforce the popular choice. The declaration : "It is easy enough
to save time here ifyou know how to pick your work "became a familiar confidence from
students prone to think of the course of study as more or less of a bargain counter.
There is no way of telling precisely how widespread such practices are. They cer-
tainly exist to an extent sufficient to provoke the deploring criticism of such teachers
as are accustomed to better standards, and it is evident that the present elective sys-
tem, together with administrative laxity in matters of credentials and examinations,
gives them every opportunity and encouragement. Furthermore this competitive at-
titude leads naturally to jealousy of any agency set up to deal quickly and efficiently
with student needs. Where a registration committee exists, its members are suspected
by their colleagues of guiding students so far as possible into their own elective
courses; where the president controls the registration, the possibility of such jealousy
arising is a strong deterrent from effecting a rational distribution of duties. At Kirks-
ville the system of student advisers was opposed by some teachers lest their depart-
ments suffer. As a compromise it was provided that the new student choose Ms own
adviser out of a wholly strange staff, and that relations begin after registration; that
is, after the student's chief need was over!
280 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
PBESENT TENURE OP POSITION UNJUST
As has been said, the normal school instructor is appointed by the board of regents
for one or two years on the nomination of the president. This term of tenure, as well
as that of the presidents, is stipulated in the law, and is probably due to the fact
that the board itself is reorganized with each biennial renewal of two of its mem-
berships. As a principle of institutional management it is fundamentally bad, its only
alleged justification being that it is the easiest method of completely cleaning the
slate for a fresh start. Inasmuch as there are no conceivable circumstances when such
a process is necessary or wise, the effect of the arrangement is to turn the service of
excellent public officers into a series of staccato spurts punctuated with threats, "Good
behavior " is, of course, the actual term of office in most cases, and it should be so ex-
pressed. To inform an undesirable instructor that he will no longer be needed, and to
show him why, requires only more intelligent courage than to refuse him a renomi-
nation. The trouble incurred in a few cases is a small price to pay for the establish-
ment of the successful teachers in a position of security that cannot fail to result
in substantially better work. Few teachers whose positions are subject to annual
revision will plan the growth of their departments with enthusiasm for a large and dis-
tant purpose. The public that wipes out the list each year and reappoints as a favor
instead of as a right must rather expect that teachers, as well as presidents, will, if
possible, do the immediately spectacular thing to catch the eye and ensure the next
election. Growth thus becomes a matter of short, feverish, and often conflicting efforts
for recognition instead of a wholesome, harmonious development of the school.
Missouri normal school teachers are elected in May. This is the practice in many
educational institutions, but more from force of habit than because of any special
advantage. President Baldwin of Kirksville pointed out as early as 18751 that such
elections should occur in December, when the necessary data, at least in so far as old
teachers are concerned, are as available as they are at the very end of the school year.
There is every reason to adopt this suggestion. If teachers must be elected annually,
they should be definitely assured of their positions at the earliest possible moment. It
is a wholly unnecessary injustice to hold academic folk who are dependent upon sea-
sonal appointment, in suspense until their chances for employment elsewhere are gone
or greatly reduced. To ensure a good choice, new teachers must be engaged whenever
they can be secured; granted a competent president, the only rational policy is that
of colleges of good grade, namely, to make the president's selection equivalent to an
appointment.
A further reason for appointments early in the year applies especially to conditions
as they now exist. Elections of the major portion of the staff, if occurring in January
or February, would be confirmed by relatively experienced boards in all cases. Under
the present arrangement, whenever board appointments are made for a purpose, that
1 State Report, 1875, page 46.
THE STAFF 281
is, to oust a president or certain objectionable teachers, the newly reorganized board9
meeting first in March or April, with usually two, and possibly three or four, new
members, feels compelled to take hold and overturn things at once. Were they obliged
to wait until the following school year, the intervening contact with the school and
its personnel, as well as with public opinion, would certainly result in added discre-
tion for meeting the supposed crisis, and abrupt upheavals, which have been the bane
of some state-controlled institutions, would be less likely to occur.1
LEAVES OF ABSENCE FOIL STUDY OK EXPERIENCE
Leaves of absence for study may be taken by teachers practically at any time de-
sired, if the necessary arrangements can be made for handling the absentee's courses.
The boards are uniformly generous in holding open his position, but he is under no
obligation to return unless he wishes. At Springfield the further step has been taken
of supporting for three months, in return for each three years of service, a teacher
who is absent for study. The apparent excellence of this plan is marred, however,
by the fact that such a teacher's absence is usually at the expense of his colleagues,
who are asked to assume his courses, no substitute being secured. One naturally
objects to profiting on these terms, which are a palpable injustice to all concerned.
That every teacher should make adequate provision for regular periods of uninter-
rupted study, or of travel and observation, as the case may require, will some time
be as definitely demanded as is now a considerable initial training. It is a matter of
ensuring sufficient high reservoirs of power to make the daily flow spontaneous and
forceful. It is not likely, however, that under present conditions, provision for this
can be expected solely from the teacher. The same arguments that are urged in favor
of contributions for retiring allowances apply here with double force, for the present
vitality of the school is directly involved. It would not be unreasonable to expect each
teacher to put aside annually a given amount of his salary for use in a periodically
recurring year of study, the school contributing the major share of the expense and
releasing him at as frequent periods as the nature of the arrangement would justify.
Another similar obligation of the school toward its teachers is to secure an inti-
mate, oft-renewed familiarity with the conditions of teaching, particularly in the dis-
trict or region served by the institution. This need is two-fold. To be successful guides,
teachers must have fresh conceptions of the conditions in which their students are
to work. These can be obtained by frequent visits among the schools, and by talks
with returned graduates. In each of two successive years Maryville has conducted a
complete canvass of its district, sending its teachers from school to school to study
the situation of each teacher and to ascertain peculiar needs and problems. This in
some form should be a constant feature of every normal schoofs annual program. But
1 The removal of the president at Warrensburg- in 1915 is a case in point (see page 47). The new board fell on its prey
at its first meeting, when the new members had had no opportunity whatever to become familiar with the real sit-
uation for themselves. It is at least doubtful whether affairs would have taken the same course after nine months1
acquaintance.
282 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
the greater need is different. Most normal school teachers have had some experience in
teaching elementary or high school classes before doing normal school work. As the lat-
ter duties fill the horizon this experience fades rapidly into a dim background; subjects
and methods of approach change, and a teacher ten years out of elementary teaching
may easily be a complete stranger in a rural or graded school. The problems have be-
come theoretical and academic, and have lost their grim and vital aspects. To prepare
successful teachers, a normal school should not permit this. Each instructor should be
able to convince the student that he can feel the problem vividly, and that he under-
stands how to teach children now. Much valuable experience for this purpose could be
acquired in the local practice school, but this is rarely done except by professional
supervisors. At best it is a hothouse reproduction of the real school; usually better,
certainly not the same. A supplementary plan, which every normal school could adopt
to a greater or less extent, would give each teacher a frequent turn of a week or more
in a neighboring school giving some instruction himself, studying the other teachers to
observe how well the normal school was doing its work, noting needed modifications,
and in general establishing direct and stimulating relations with the school. From
not a few schools it would be entirely worth while to bring in exchange a first class
teacher to the normal school for a similar period to discuss practical problems with
young students there. An interchange of this sort would keep schools and training
college together in close sympathy, and would make a fossilized faculty impossible.
ADMINISTRATIVE USE OF PROFESSIONAL TRAINING
An account of the general training of the instructors in the Missouri normal schools
has already been given.1 It is important, however, to note how the directors of these
schools utilize the training of their teachers from an administrative point of view.
The questions as to which departments deserve the best trained teachers, which de-
partments shall carry the highest salaries, what distinction as to training and salary
shall be maintained between collegiate and secondary teachers, what use shall be made
of student-teachers, and finally what modifications in standard, if any, shall be allowed
for summer instructors — all of these are considerations for which the administrative
officer must find a practical solution.
DEPARTMENTAL DISTRIBUTION OF TRAINING
So far as amount of basic training is concerned, the academic groups are not sharply
distinguished one from another.2 Of sixteen teachers of mathematics, two had a two-
year diploma only, and one had none. Agriculture, history, and science have fared
a little better: of thirty-nine teachers in these subjects, only one held a two-year
diploma, and but one was without a diploma. If the institutions where the training was
secured be considered, the teachers of foreign languages stand highest, with eighty-
two per cent of their number from first class schools ; household arts, history, and agri-
1 See page 99. 2 See page 421.
THE STAFF 283
culture are also relatively high. Foreign language teachers lead also in amount of
advanced study.
It is the relation of professional to academic subjects that possesses the chief sig-
nificance. Only three-fifths of the teachers who deal with the special subjects peculiar
to the normal schools have a training of four years or more, while ninety-three per
cent of the so-called "academic" teachers have collegiate degrees, forty-one per cent
having graduate degrees as compared with nineteen per cent in the professional
group. The disparity is still considerable even when the supervisors are separated from
the regular teachers of education, but no rational view of teacher- training will ac-
knowledge the justice of such a separation ; instructors charged with the supervision
and criticism of students in their first actual teaching experience should be no less
thoroughly prepared than the best in the school In the quality of their training,
furthermore, the instructors in education are noticeably behind their academic col-
leagues, having one-fourth fewer degrees from high grade institutions,
To a critical judgment it would appear that if contrast must exist, these relations
should be exactly reversed, altho there is no reason why every teacher should not Tbe
required to possess or obtain an adequate training. It may be asserted that the super-
visors and those similarly selected have the equivalent of a standard training in their
field ; that they are chosen for practical experience and skill, and that a degree would
mean little or nothing in their cases. That this is the theory is evident, on the whole,
by reference to the salaries paid the two groups.1 The average salary paid to women
supervisors is not greatly below the average for women in all academic subjects, and
the average for men teaching education is second from the top. The status of the edu-
cation department^ therefore, tho far from foremost, is apparently intended to be
about the same financially as that of the others. This being the case, the policy pursued
in relation to the training required seems a mistake. The fact that they are "prac-
tical" chiefly is a dangerous recommendation for teachers in this department of all
others. Practical experience is wholly indispensable, but in a field that is only just
seeking to make good its prerogatives, a field whose workers should, by sheer weight
of ability, dominate the schools they serve, a thorough general education is of coordi-
nate importance. Throughout the country, speeches, writings, and classroom perform-
ances of a slovenly and almost illiterate character have been perpetrated in the name
of "education" by persons indebted only to "practical experience." Crude "surveys"
and "experiments" are submitted as scientific contributions. These offerings not only
seriously injure the cause of specific training among educated people, but they are
worse than useless in their immediate effects. Better for every purpose the intelligent
reactions of a liberally educated mind innocent of "methods55 than the undisciplined
"professionalism'5 that comes from half-educated instructors. Missouri appears to have
less than its share of such lapses among its professional corps, but the tables should be
completely turned in the other direction.
1 See pages 285, 424.
284 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
Before leaving the general topic of departmental training it may not be out of
place to indicate certain facts as to experience and tenure. Just half of the academic
teachers have taught in normal schools for more than five years. Among teachers of
education only two-fifths, and among the supervisors but one-fourth, have had so much
experience; one may conclude, therefore, that instruction given by the professional
staff is on the whole less maturely developed than that in academic departments.
In looking thru the early catalogues one is impressed with the number of teachers
of education who appear to have been drawn directly from superintendencies with-
out special training in education. In the present corps of fifteen men teachers seven
were of this sort, while seven had supplemented their administrative experience with
special training; only one had had no administrative experience.
DEPARTMENTAL DISTRIBUTION OF SALARIES
A table in the Appendix1 presents an array of departmental salaries, the details of
which will be of interest chiefly to the individual schools. All instructors are included
who received an annual salary of $800 or more. In so far as salary can measure the
quality of instruction, the table may be considered as a scale of the values attached
by the school authorities to the work of the respective departments.
At Kirksville it appears that professional instruction draws, pn the average, one
hundred dollars less than academ ic instruction; at Warrensburg the difference is over
two hundred dollars, while at Cape Girardeau it is but seventy dollars. Springfield, on
the contrary, pays its professional department about one hundred dollars more than
the others, and Mary ville shows a similar tho smaller balance. The second would ap-
pear to be the truer policy, provided the difference represents an actual balance in
weight of ability. As already indicated above, it is impossible to have a first class
training school for teachers when the professional department is of relatively inferior
calibre; and the salary account usually measures this with fair accuracy.
The relative value assigned to the various departments by the normal schools as
a group appears best when the average salaries are arranged serially as shown by the
table on page £85. This table makes clear the remarkable fact that financially the
teaching of pure science is given the highest rating in Missouri normal schools; while if
the different scale of payment for men and women be taken into account, the Latin (!)
teachers are the best paid of the men, and share first place with teachers of math-
ematics among the women. The average salary of instructors in education stands fifth
in a series of eleven groups, and if the supervisors were included, it would stand sixth
($1505). The cost of critic supervisors by themselves is next to the lowest, and even
among the women rises only to the middle of the series. It is true, to be sure, that the
courses in education draw upon many departments, as well as upon the supervising
staff, but these courses are the distinguishing characteristic of the institution and
should obviously be given by the best instructors obtainable, who will, in general, be
1 See page 424.
THE STAFF
£85
RELATIVE IMPORTANCE OF DEPARTMENTS AS EXPRESSED IN THE
ORDER OF AVERAGE SALARIES
Men
Women \ Both Men and Women
NumbeTs of
Av. Sal
Av. Sal )
j Av. Sal.
Men Women
Ancient Languages $1868
Ancient Languages $1420
Science $1735
17 0
Education 1773
Mathematics 1490
Ancient Languages 1676
4 3
Science 1735
Modern Languages 1400
Agriculture 1644
11 0
Mathematics 1711
Education 1341
Mathematics 1635
20 7
Special Subjects 1711
English 1336
Education 1573
22 19
English 1657
Supervision 1335
Government, History,
Agriculture 1644
Government, History,
and Geography 1542
29 8
Government, History,
and Geography 1335
Modern Languages 1483
3 4
and Geography 1599
Household Arts 1301
English 1464
14 21
Modern Languages 1593
Special Subjects 1197
Special Subjects 1425
20 25
Supervision 1368
1 31
Household Arts 1301
0 11
Extreme Variation $275
$223
$434
those most highly paid. If the best-paid teachers are unable to give these courses, some-
thing is wrong, and the school where this is true is not what it purports to be. It is
certainly far from being a mere coincidence that in the school at Springfield, where
the relations of the education department appeared to every member of the enquiry
staff to have been most satisfactorily worked out, the professional group should be re-
ceiving more, on the average, than the academic group, even tho the maximum sala-
ries were surpassed in other schools.
SECONDARY versus COLLEGIATE INSTRUCTORS
In spite of the wide field of instruction ranging, in all five Missouri normal schools,
from the first year of high school to the fourth year of college work, the distinction
between secondary and collegiate instructors has not been drawn,1 There is indeed a
consistent difference in average salary as the college work increases. But the number
of teachers doing college work alone is so small, except at Kirksville, that a signifi-
cant contrast could be found only between the group having chiefly college work and
the group having chiefly secondary work, Here the average salary of those men having
more than one-half of their work in college classes is about four dollars more than the
average salary of those most of whose work was in secondary classes ; and about the
same thing is true of the women. As marking a distinction between a secondary and
a collegiate grade of work, such a difference is hardly important. The average salary
of the ten women doing some secondary work is thirteen dollars more than that of the
two women doing college work only.
Much the same situation appears if the comparison be made from the standpoint
of training. For example, inspect the secondary and collegiate student term-grades
1 See pagre 425.
286 OPEEATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
reported by the thirty-two men and nine women who hold masters1 degrees or higher,
from institutions of the first class, or a similar distribution of classes taught by them
in the school year ending with August, 1916.1 These groups of best prepared teachers
are, it seems, finding from twenty-eight to forty-five per cent of their classes In the
secondary field, and the total grades reported follow closely the same figures.
From the point of view of good administration the above facts are as conclusive as
any that could be cited in determining the character of the work done in these schools.
Teachers that are continually and largely busy with the secondary phases of instruc-
tion, especially when their programs call for twenty or twenty-five class sessions per
week5 are in the very nature of the case unfitted for what all collegiate experience
requires of college teachers. They are undoubtedly much above the average of high
school teachers; they are quite as certainly below the standard of the collegiate insti-
tutions with all the years of which they now claim to compete.2 In respect to teaching
ability, their training, their environment, and the very fact that they deal so constantly
with elementary situations probably do and certainly should enable them to out-
rank the younger college teachers. But to expect that with their present mixed and
overloaded programs they should be qualified to conduct advanced instruction suited
to the junior and senior college years would be absurd. Any one familiar with the real
situation knows that with several exceptions they are not so qualified, and that the
four-year collegiate curricula have been built up out of a multiplicity of beginners'
courses. Conditions cannot be good until the collegiate instructors are such in train-
ing, program, salary, and performance. As recommended in another section, if length-
ened curricula are to be offered, or even if first class work is to be done in the one and
two year curricula, the teachers who have been appropriately trained should be re-
lieved of secondary work and placed in their proper fields, while those who are essen-
tially secondary teachers should discontinue collegiate instruction.
PABT-TIME AND STUDENT ASSISTANTS
The policy pursued with reference to part-time or student assistants giving instruc-
tion during the regular session is fairly consistent in all of the schools except at Kirks-
ville. At Cape Girardeau no such assistant was employed in I9I5-I6; the author-
ities of the school are definitely opposed to the practice. At Warrensburg three were
used, one for one term to teach a class in secondary geometry; one for the year as a
supervisor; and one in industrial arts. At Springfield there was none. At Maryville
1 See page 425.
2 The schools^ from the early catalogues down, have made a great point of the fact that their high school students,
and even the * suh-normal " pupils, have had the advantage of the " best teachers " in the school. This has no doubt
been very fine, hut it appears to have completely escaped attention that the instruction of college students at the
other end of the ladder must necessarily be correspondingly impaired. The other point urged in favor of the present
policy is that advanced teachers should " keep in touch" with elementary and secondary instruction. This is not
to be disputed. It is one thing:, however, for such a teacher to take a genuine elementary or secondary class daily,
weekly, or occasionally, for demonstration or practice ; this is indispensable for every effective instructor of teach-
ers. It is obviously a wholly different thing- for " college " teachers to be loaded down with nondescript secondary
classes, the like of which exists nowhere else, and which serve no purpose of illustration to students or of prac-
tice for the teacher himself.
THE STAFF S87
one woman taught two classes in secondary mathematics, and one gave an hour a day
as assistant in domestic art.
Kirksville has for many years followed a different plan. Juniors or seniors in the
four-year college curriculum have been employed for small fees in one or two classes
each throughout the year. In the regular session of 1915—16 there were nine men and
six women, making in all fifteen such teachers, who received from $10 to $50 per
month for their services, eight drawing $25 per month or less. Four were in the depart-
ment of manual arts, and four taught music ; the remaining seven were given classes
in Latin, history, German, agriculture, photography, commercial subjects, and school
management. Except for one who taught beginning Latin and another who taught
rural school management, all conducted classes attended by college students. During
the year these fifteen student-teachers reported three hundred eighty- two student
grades in college subjects, three hundred thirty -eight grades in subjects open to both
college and secondary students (manual arts, music, and so forth), and three hundred
fifteen grades of secondary students. It is clear that the major work of these teachers
was with college students.
The ground on which the employment of student assistants may be justified is
chiefly that such employment furnishes needed financial aid for students wishing to
continue their studies ; and the supposition is that the advanced studies they desire
to pursue are of a nature to warrant their attendance, while the work for which they
are paid is presumed to be of service. The apparent advantages to the school inciden-
tal to such an arrangement are important, as many a small college yearning for stu-
dents has discovered. They are two-fold : first, the services of such instructors cost
but little. The aggregate weekly class hours per quarter handled by the fifteen teachers
at Kirksville numbered three hundred, or the equivalent of nearly four teachers work-
ing to the Kirksville standard of twenty periods per week for the full eleven months.
At the Kirksville average of $1591 for academic instructors these should have been
paid $6364, whereas they received less than that by $£71 £ — not far from the salary of
two full-time teachers. Such saving enables the school to relieve regular instructors
for a larger offering higher up in the curriculum, where these same part-time teachers
become the students, thus realizing the second and more important object of the plan.
fivery institution desirous of enlarging its scope, whether it be a four-year college seek-
ing to add graduate work, or a two-year school seeking to develop collegiate status^
has difficulty in attracting and retaining voluntary advanced students when its fac-
ulty and material facilities remain practically unchanged. Recourse must therefore be
had to other means, one of which is to subsidise capable graduates to take the first
and second year courses they have not as yet had, together with what advanced work
can be laid out by a teacher freed by their help in lower classes. This nucleus attracts
others. Such "pressure"" for these courses is presently discovered as to require more
teachers, and the four-year program is shortly in full swing.
Two objections make against the wisdom of a policy of this sort. There is every
288 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
probability, in the first place, that longer attendance at the school for further study
is not in the best interests of these teacher-students. They have finished their course,
and should now be directed where genuine advanced courses are available under in-
structors who have had advanced training for that purpose.1 A certain type of student
has to be protected against himself in this respect. His inclination is to remain in
familiar surroundings, to his eventual detriment. The school should here consult the
ultimate interests of its graduates in their preparation for public service. The second
consideration is still more obvious. The use of partly trained and inexperienced teach-
ers in lower classes as a lever with which to lift the school is plainly opposed to the
real interests of the major portion of the student body, who for years to come will be
found in these lower grades in which the main function of the institution centres.
First class teaching of these students should be guaranteed at all costs and at every
point. The school's contact with the great mass of them is brief at best; for hundreds
it is but a single year. What shall be said, then, of a policy that introduces student-
teaching at this point in order that the beneficiaries may be induced to remain for
a junior and senior year, while the regular instructors are relieved from the service
of the elementary teacher in order to lengthen the curriculum for the sake of the
few who are preparing for high school and administrative positions?2 The lengths to
which the expense of this elaboration at the top without corresponding financial
support may drive the administrator are illustrated at Kirksville in the department
of manual arts, where for a prolonged period a student-teacher on corresponding
salary was given full charge, and while thus in charge received credit toward his de-
gree for " practice teaching," notwithstanding the fact that no one was in a position
to supervise his efforts save the head of the institution.3 This use of advanced degrees
to pay for instruction is effective in creating " degree classes," as the experience at
Kirksville shows, but it is not education.
INSTRUCTORS IN THE SUMMER SESSION
The problem of securing instructors for the summer session is a critical administra-
tive concern. The question is not so much one of finding people who will teach. The
colleges and universities are generally closed, and both their advanced students and
their teachers are available; superintendents of schools find a lull in their work and
can often be had, while graduate teachers who work during the winter in the schools
come flocking back. The main problem is to find teachers of requisite experience who
1 This is not to be construed as meaning: that three and four year curricula should not be offered. As explained else-
where, the point is that such curricula should be offered only by fully qualified teachers to students fully prepared
to take them.
2 The school in question has been pronounced in its condemnation of inadequate training for elementary teachers.
To quote its Bulletin of December, 1910, page 9: " It is due to artificially created conditions, largely to arbitrary uni-
versity domination, that the abnormal and wasteful discrimination has been made whereby advanced scholarship
is required for high school teachers and poor scholarship or none at all for elementary teachers." It is difficult to
see wherein its own practice is essentially different.
3 This lack of adequate supervision of student-teachers is a serious defect in the Kirksville scheme. The situation
is irregularly handled ; some are apparently given careful attention, while others are neglected, often teaching at
an hour when their superiors are busy, thus missing them altogether.
THE STAFF 289
have sufficient training in education to fit into such an environment and maintain
the integrity of a schooFs standards. Attendance increases eighty-two per cent, the
median age of students rises from twenty in the regular session to twenty-two among
those attending only in the summer. With these older students, who are usually ex-
perienced teachers, collegiate subjects are in greater demand than before. At the same
time, a large portion of the summer attendance is made up of seekers for "approved
grades," which can be written in on their certificates in lieu of examination. Many at-
tend only in the summer ; many more get their first experience at the normal school
in this session.1 It is, therefore, peculiarly the school's duty to see that each student
finds what he needs in the best form in which it can be provided.
TRAINING OF SUMMER INSTRUCTORS
In the summer of 1916 the normal schools increased their staffs temporarily by the
employment of fifty men and thirty-one women.2 Three-quarters of them were natives
of Missouri, and more than four-fifths had their secondary training in Missouri. The
median age both of men and women in all the schools together was twenty-nine; at
Warrensburg it was twenty-six, and at Mary ville thirty-seven.
The policies adopted by different schools appear markedly divergent.3 One school
employed college graduates except for one who had attended college without gradu-
ating; seven of the ten were from first class institutions, and three held advanced de-
grees. Four had had normal school training also, three of them locally. Another school
secured teachers more than half of whom had only normal school training, and of
those who had college or university experience, only half had taken degrees, while
none possessed an advanced degree. Only about half of the entire number at this
latter school had four-year diplomas of any sort. Nineteen of the twenty-seven had
been trained at the school itself.
The professional experience of these summer school teachers ranges from none at
all to twenty-six years; the medians run as follows: Kirksville, four; Warrensburg,
six; Cape Girardeau and Springfield, seven; and Mary ville, ten years. Mary ville ap-
pears to have used her well-trained special instructors chiefly for secondary students.
Springfield employs high school teachers, but uses them largely for the secondary
classes, for which they are presumably fitted. Earksville, on the contrary, turns many
collegiate students over to teachers drawn from secondary positions.4
It is of interest in the above connection to observe to what extent the subjects
taught in the normal summer school correlate with the teacher's work during the year,
1 Thirty-nine per cent of the year's enrolment in all the schools in 1913-14 attended a normal school for the first
time in a summer session. This is nearly as many as begin in the fall — forty -two per cent
2 Thirteen others were employed from whom the facts of training could not be obtained : Warrensburg1, seven ;
Springfield, four ; and Maryville, two.
3 See page 426.
4 Forty-two per cent of the collegiate student grades (762) reported by the special summer session instructors at
Kirksville were reported by high school teachers or undergraduate students. At Warrensburg: the proportion was
twenty-nine per cent, at Cape Girardeau twenty-five per cent, at Springfield ten per cent, and at Maryviile twelve
per cent.
290 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
tho absence of such a correlation is not necessarily a proof of lack of preparation in the
subject taught in summer. Correlation either wholly or in large part appears in from
forty to eighty per cent of the cases in the various schools. Lack of such correlation
is evident when a superintendent of schools who regularly teaches American history
is assigned to "General Method" and "History of Education;" when another who
teaches high school commercial branches in the winter teaches history in the summer;
when a teacher of high school physics conducts a collegiate class in stock-judging.
Any single case of this sort of shifting may be wholly explicable and proper; but a
large amount of it makes one suspect the continued vitality of the ancient normal
school doctrine that "a normal school professor can teach anything."
HOURS AND SALARIES OF SUMMER INSTRUCTORS
The schools vary considerably in the extent to which they use their summer teach-
ers, as well as in the salaries they pay them.1 To contrast extremes again, one insti-
tution asks its summer instructors for full programs in eleven out of twelve cases,
another has one-third doing full work, nearly two-fifths having but one class each,
and two-thirds having either one or two classes only. The secret of this is, of course,
that the teachers in the latter school are largely those who have enrolled for courses
"of their own, hoping in many cases ultimately to secure degrees.2 Of the two schools
quoted above, one pays none of its instructors less than four dollars and pays only two
of them less than five dollars per weekly hour; whereas the other pays over one-half of
its extra teachers less than three dollars, and only about one-fifth receive five dollars
or more.
CONTRASTING POLICIES OF SUMMER SESSION ADMINISTRATION
The facts presented above disclose two well-defined policies of summer school
administration, expressed with consistent contrast in the two schools to which allu-
sion has been made. The school at Mary ville provided its increased summer attend-
ance with experienced teachers of mature age, trained in good institutions and em-
ployed at respectable figures, to give their full time instructing in fields in which they
were regularly engaged. This provision was made, too, not only for college students
but for pupils of secondary grade. Assuming that as good judgment was used in selec-
tion as was shown in fixing conditions of employment, the students at Maryville in
the summer of 1916 had unquestionably superior advantages; it is apparent that the
school authorities had nothing in view except the excellence of the instruction that
could be furnished. At Kirksville, on the other hand, such teachers were engaged as
would themselves register for advanced courses. Of the twenty-seven, eighteen worked
on part time and as many (fifteen men and three women) were enrolled in courses.
Fewer than half had had four years of higher schooling from any source. As they were
1 See page 427,
2 Those of whom this is true are noted in the table, page 427.
THE STAFF £91
mostly part-time instructors, their number was abnormally large, thus swelling the
"faculty" list, while their presence as students helped to fill out the upper classes that
would eventually take degrees, thus heavily emphasizing the senior college idea. Altho
themselves but juniors or seniors, the undergraduate members of this group of teachers
turned in one hundred thirty-six freshmen or sophomore grades in such subjects as
"Teaching of English," "Electricity," "Food Preparation," and so forth. At Mary-
ville, while two-fifths had attended a normal school, and a third of the group had at-
tended Maryville, none had had normal school training only; at Kirksville well over
half had had only normal training, and had received it all at Kirksville, while over
two-thirds had attended there. At Maryville the professional experience (median
years, ten), like the age (median years, thirty-seven), is high, and the salaries paid
are sufficient to ensure a relatively good personnel; at Kirksville a median of four
years' experience, including, of course, all kinds of teaching, means that the experi-
ence in higher instruction is in most cases nil, while the salaries are cut down be-
cause the opportunity can be made attractive by giving credit toward a degree.
On the whole, the situation at Maryville impresses one as a sincere attempt to solve
the educational problem for its students in their interests; the administration at
Kirksville, on the other hand, leaves the impression of constant and skilful manipu-
lation not in the real interests of the students, but to build up on a limited budget
the kind of institution that this particular school long since set out at all costs to
become. Strategy for this purpose finds unusual scope in the summer session. It is flat-
tering for a young teacher or superintendent within measurable distance of his degree
to be asked to give instruction where he has just been or still is a student. It is attrac-
tive even to the normal school graduate who now ranks as an alumnus to be recalled
thus early to his alma mater. By giving each a class or two only, these favors can be
multiplied, and by passing them out with discernment, one can reward faithful sup-
porters, win the interest of those who are wavering, or even invade hostile territory.
Some superintendents, when so attached, bring with them to the school a whole train
of their admiring teachers and students. Thus the plan increases the attendance,
relieves the regular teachers, reenforces the upper classes and the degree list, popu-
larizes the school, cuts down the expense, and keeps the influential teachers of the
region at the school and away from the university or other higher institutions where
they ought now to be — all obviously good business, tho again unfortunately not
education.
Whatever may be true of a college, the summer session of a professional school.,
altho subordinate to such a school's main function, is a responsibility that can neither
be exploited nor neglected. It is a general observation of all professional schools,
thoroughly substantiated by theory, that practitioners of some experience, coming for
study at intervals in their practice, work with greater insight and profit than do com-
plete novices. The latter are working up their initial speed, as it were, while the former
are simply increasing their momentum. Among teachers the economic situation makes
OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
it necessary to provide the best possible opportunities for study during the summer.
It is not primarily for the sake of the teachers, but for the schools in which they will
teach, that the summer school facilities should be as fine in quality and as well organ-
ized as it is possible to make them. Haphazard experiments can no more be risked dur-
ing the summer than at any other time in the year. The natural difficulty of giving
each of the many new applicants what he needs is great enough without in addition
sacrificing the quality,
It should be borne in mind, furthermore, that the attendance at the summer ses-
sion has been greatly stimulated by the pressure brought to bear upon seekers of cer-
tificates to get their "approved grades" at the normal schools instead of by examina-
tion, and that on the strength of these enormous summer enrolments in the secondary
and junior collegiate fields the normal schools have been steadily demanding increased
aid from the state. To a candid observer it may fairly seem like a misappropriation
of such funds when by an administrative trick the instruction of those in whose inter-
est the aid Is granted, Is cheapened, and the funds are diverted to a purpose which,
however gratifying to the administration, is certainly much less important to the
state. If senior college instruction is given, It must certainly be given by amply trained
and otherwise qualified teachers. If, however, such advanced instruction can be pro-
vided only at the cost of reducing the quality of the instruction given to the lower
classes below the level of that in a first class city high school, then a sincere institu-
tion will have nothing to do with it.
B. THE STUDENT BODY: SIGNIFICANT FEATURES IN SELECTION, ORGANIZATION, AND
ADMINISTRATIVE TREATMENT
1. Men as Normal School Students
Shortly after the establishment of the Missouri normal schools, three-fifths of the
students were men; at present, two-thirds are women. Among the students In the reg-
ular session the men doing secondary work number thirty-eight per cent or nearly
two-fifths, while of the collegiate attendance a little over one-fourth are men. In the
summer session the proportion of collegiate men drops to one-fifth.1
MOTIVES IN MALE ATTENDANCE
Light is thrown on the character of this male attendance by a consideration of the
motive by which it is actuated. Four-fifths of the men attending the schools,2 when they
were visited, reported their intentions as to teaching, and of these seventy-eight per
cent stated that they had no intention of teaching permanently, altho seventy-five
per cent said they expected to do some teaching. Of the women one-half stated that
they did not intend to teach permanently. This fact should occasion no surprise, inas-
1 This is for the summer-only group ; of the entire summer attendance the collegiate men constituted 22.8 per cent.
* Information secured at Kirksville, Warrensburg, and Maryville only. See page 434.
MEN AS NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENTS S93
much as the tenure of women teachers is traditionally terminated by marriage, which
is normally expected by the majority both of men and women. For this reason possibly
the proportion is about the same among collegiate and secondary women. But that
nearly eighty per cent of all the men students replying, and a still larger proportion of
the secondary group, should admit that, altho attending a school supported by the
state for the purpose of training teachers, they expected to make teaching but a tem-
porary stage on the way to a permanent occupation, is certainly a situation of great
significance.
REACTION OF MALE ATTENDANCE ON THE INSTITUTION
It cannot be said, of course, that it is any worse to prepare men than it is to pre-
pare women for temporary positions as teachers; the chances are that the men will
have as long a tenure as do a large number of the women. The importance of the fact
lies not in the brief tenure of the men trained, but in the reaction that their pres-
ence entails upon the institution itself. Women may be prepared as specifically as
possible for their work, precisely because it is their principal vocational outlook ; in
general, except in large urban centres, educated women either teach or many, and
even in the latter case their training for teaching is still of value, tho perhaps not so
valuable as some other form of training might have been. A man, however, who has
definitely pledged himself to medicine, law, or business, and thinks of teaching solely
as a potboiler, or one who is merely convinced of his discontent with teaching and
is open to conviction as to what is better worth doing — either of these is attracted
by the normal school as the cheapest form of credit-granting institution^ with the
advantage of its sponsorship for the needed teaching position thrown in. To this
class of student a prescribed curriculum, enforced prerequisites, and above all re-
quired courses dealing thoroughly with teaching are objectionable; while the "prov-
ing up" system, where each is credited liberally "on his merits" without too much
examination, the plan of free election, and a minimum of required "pedagogy" are
just the thing. Work that will not count as credit in college or university must be
avoided, and all courses must be as "academic" as possible. These well-known pre-
ferences of men students tally fairly well with the policies of the Missouri normal
schools, and one has only to visit the schools, read their literature, and talk with
their officers, to realize that a cardinal principle of their operation has been to retain
men at all hazards.
Ostensibly the reason for the efforts to attract men to the institutions is to "retain
men in the profession," a laudable purpose, but one that receives an unexpected twist
in its working out. It is the elementary schools primarily that have lost men teachers;
high schools in Missouri employ men in over one-third of their teaching positions, and
the principals and superintendents are very generally men. When, therefore, the normal
schools appeal for facilities whereby they may "retain men in the profession," what
they really mean to say is that they should be enabled to prepare men for high school
OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
and administrative positions — two aims that are, of course, quite unlike that which
governs the bulk of their effort, and require different curricula and equipment. This
latent purpose is shown clearly in the type of school chosen by those who "intend
to teach immediately on leaving this school," as the question ran.1 Thirty-four per
cent even of those men who have not yet finished their own high school studies have
their eye on high school or administrative positions, while over four-fifths of the men
in the normal school proper expect such work, tho it be only as a temporary employ-
ment. The actual records of the graduates show the same result.
It is the unavoidable conclusion from all the evidence that a desire on the part of
the normal schools to retain their men has been not only a leading factor in develop-
ing such methods and policies as should make it easy for men to enter and profitable
for them to remain, but also that it has been primarily responsible for the change of
emphasis from the elementary to the high school teacher. The latter required nor-
mally four years of college work, an expansion that would afford ample opportunity,
on a free elective basis, for enough academic work to hold the average man who had
once enrolled.2 At the same time, the accepted preparation of a high school teacher
was everywhere loose enough professionally to enable a man to ignore the teaching
courses to a very considerable extent. The outcome of this development was the
"college" idea, pure and simple, for advanced students. With this once established
for the sake of the men, women naturally availed themselves of it, aided therein by
the encouragement of the school authorities, until to-day, of the group of collegi-
ate normal school women, forty-five per cent avow themselves as prospective high
school teachers, together with eighteen percent of the women still doing secondary
work.3
This policy may have had some effect. Kirksville, the school that has followed the
plan most vigorously, has kept a proportion of collegiate men as high as thirty-two
per cent;4 and Cape Girardeau, a school that has also laid great stress on it, even offer-
ing curricula wholly free from professional flavor, has retained still more, having
thirty-three per cent. Warrensburg, Springfield, and Maryville, on the other hand,
schools that until recently concerned themselves very specifically with the elementary
1 See page 434.
2 A question put to the students at all schools furnishes unexpected light at this point. " What have you found to
be the most valuable feature of this school for your purpose?" was a question taken advantage of by many students
to express preference for various departments. Forty per cent of the college men declared for the "academic work"
as compared with thirteen per cent of the college women. Of the latter, fully one-half voted for "professional work"
as the most valuable feature.
3 A memorandum from the sixty-hour (i.e. two-year) class of 1915 at Kirksville, prepared by the class, contains a state-
ment as to "Character of positions sought for next year,** as follows: "Superin tendencies, 6; principalships, 4; his-
tory teachers, 7 ; English teachers, 7; mathematics teachers, 6 ; music teachers, 6 ; Latin teachers, 2 ; science teachers.
2; agriculture teachers, 2; manual arts teachers, 2 ; domestic science teachers, 2; physical education teachers, 1; com-
merce teachers, 1 ; bookkeeping teachers, 1 ; elementary school teacher, 1; primary teachers, 1; primary supervisor,
1; undecided, 3." The elementary school comes poorly off with two in a group all of whom have barely sufficient
training to meet standard requirements for elementary school work.
4 The outcome of this emphasis at Kirksville is even more noticeable in the product of the school. While preparing
one-fifth of the rural teachers trained at normal schools, and less than one-sixth of the teachers in graded elemen-
tary schools so trained, Kirksville is credited with twenty-seven per cent of the first class high school group (see
page 439) and over forty per cent of the superintendents in first class systems who attended normal schools (see
page 378). The latter were all men.
PROBLEM OF THE SECONDARY STUDENT 295
problem even tho many of their graduates became high school teachers, show a pro-
portion of collegiate men students of twenty-five, twenty-six, and twenty-two per
cent respectively. All things considered, it seems quite probable that if prescribed
curricula prepared solely for the purpose of training efficient teachers for various
fields of service, secondary included, and definitely committing a candidate to that
service, should be introduced in the Missouri normal schools, the numbers of men in
attendance would be very greatly reduced by the disappearance of those who were
using the schools merely for personal advancement. This has been the case In other
schools that have had the courage to prefer a high standard of professional training
to the weak popularity of a nondescript college. The bonajide male candidates that
remained could then be given, In selected schools, differentiated curricula suitable for
their work in high school instruction or in school administration.
%. Problem of the Secondary Student
A second problem in the selection of students confronts the normal school in the
question of its attitude toward students of secondary grade. This is a question that
depends partly on the normal school's conception of its function as an educational
Institution, and partly on the general policy of the state as expressed in its legisla-
tion relating to teachers'5 certificates and Its appropriations for purposes of training.
From the Institutional point of view the problem is difficult because of its radical
nature. For thirty years the normal schools were almost wholly secondary institutions
in so far as any current generic term can be applied to them. Since 1900 they have
grown steadily and firmly Into professional institutions of collegiate character. The
question now is what to do with the remnants of past practice. Familiar association
and administrative habit cling to the past, while freedom and progress require ad-
justment to the present and future. A complete abandonment of secondary work In
normal schools will come in time; should It be brought about at once?
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE EXTREME AGE GROUPS
There are in all the schools over two thousand secondary students in the regular
sessions, and seventeen hundred more in the summer. Twenty-five hundred are women,
and over a thousand are men. What are their distinguishing traits ? Inasmuch as a
wide range of age Is the essential feature of the problem that they present, it is best
for the sake of clearness to Ignore the Intermediate ages of nineteen and twenty, which
represent a natural transition between the extremes, and to compare the younger
group directly with the older.1 About fifteen hundred are twenty-one years of age or
more — enough by themselves to fill two large high schools. They number one-third
1 Distinction in nationality is scarcely perceptible. The question of town or country breeding is also negligible ;
the older group has eight per cent more men from the country. Parental income exhibits the expected tendency :
from nearly seven hundred answers, it is clear that the older and more retarded students are from less well-to-do
homes.
OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
of the secondary students in the regular session and over half of the " summer-only'"*
attendance. Four-fifths of them attend In the spring or summer quarters when their
schools are closed. On the other hand, nearly half of the secondary students attend-
ing the regular session are but eighteen years old or less , while in the summer group
fewer than one-quarter are so young. The proportion of boys under nineteen is over
one-third in the fall, winter, and spring, but falls to one-sixth in the summer. It is
evident from this that the secondary students of the regular session are predomi-
nantly of secondary school age, while the over-age students of secondary grade attend
the normal schools chiefly in their interims of teaching.
GrEOGRAPHICAX, DISTRIBUTION
The first unmistakable evidence of divergence between these older and younger
students appears in the relative distance from which they come to school. Only one-
fifth of the older group is local to the county, while nearly half of the younger group
comes from the same county ; three-fifths of the older students come from beyond the
adjacent counties, while but one-third of the young students are so derived. At Spring-
field only nine per cent of the over-age men are local, while at Kirksville over one-
third are so ; but the younger group is more restricted locally than the older in each of
the five schools, altho to a less degree in the summer than during the regular session.
This independence with regard to locality on the part of the older secondary students
is of importance in arriving at a solution of their needs ; it is evident, as one would
expect, that they constitute a self-determined group, are less influenced than younger
students by local suggestion, and would probably go anywhere in the state for their
training almost as readily as they seek the normal school in their own district.
PREVIOUS SCHOOLING
More of the older secondary men students than of the younger have attended rural
schools, but the women show almost no difference. The record of high school attend-
ance is hardly what one would expect. In the total attendance at the regular session
of 191 3— 14, forty-seven per cent of the younger students as compared with twenty-six
per cent of the older had never attended high school elsewhere (women, fifty-four per
cent to twenty-two per cent). But among students attending only in the summer the
condition is reversed, and fifty-nine per cent of the over-age students as compared with
nineteen per cent of the younger students had never been at high school elsewhere. In
general these figures cast some doubt upon the supposedly essential service of the nor-
mal school to the older student who was presumed to be without other school priv-
ileges, and indicate that it has been recruiting heavily among such boys and girls as
should properly be in high school.
PROBLEM OF THE SECONDARY STUDENT 2>97
OPPORTUNITIES FOR HIGH SCHOOL ATTENDANCE
In order to determine further the relation of the normal school student to the high
school situation, the students at each normal school when It was visited were asked
whether there had been a three or four year high school within convenient reach of
their homes. According to their replies the age group under nineteen, which formed
forty-five per cent of all the secondary students, had four-year high schools accessi-
ble in over half of the cases; about three-fifths, if three-year high schools be included.
In the decade after 1906 the number of classified high schools in Missouri increased
from two hundred thirty-one to five hundred thirty-five — considerably more than
double ; and the number of first class high schools had increased over two hundred
seventy-five per cent, rising from sixty-three to two hundred thirty-six.1 In 1918 but
eleven of the one hundred fourteen counties in the state lacked a standard four-year
high school, and four of these had standard three-year high schools ; two only were
without a recognized two-year high school. In eighty-four of these counties, in one
hundred two schools, the state had established training centres for rural school teach-
ers; such opportunities are therefore well distributed.
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
Experience data should, of course, show that more of the older than of the younger
students have taught. They show this ; but they show also that an astonishingly large
number (thirty-eight per cent) of the older secondary men have thus far had no con-
nection with a school as teachers. Altho at Springfield only one-sixth of the older
men have had no teaching experience, at Kirksville the proportion is three-fifths.
What have these mature individuals been doing ? Are they belated farmers' boys using
the normal schools now to get a general education? Remembering that ninety per
cent of all the secondary men at Kirksville declared that they had no intention of
teaching permanently, this seems to be a reasonable conclusion.
QUALITY OF THE OLDER SECONDARY STUDENT
A further item possibly throws some light on the quality of the over-age student.
Large claims have been based upon the maturity of the students who frequent the
normal school, particularly as a justification for shortening the secondary course,
" doing three terms1 work in two," and so forth. Cases occur of active, self-educated
students completing in a few months the formal requirements that usually consume
years, and the inference is that maturity is of itself the enabling factor. If true, this
ought apparently to show in the number of programs with excess hours permitted
to older secondary students because of superior ability. With important exceptions,
this advantage, where it exists, is surprisingly small. Analysis of the secondary pro-
grams in the regular session of 1 913-14 shows that fourteen per cent of the term
1 State Report, 1916, page 68.
298 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
programs taken by the younger group consisted of twenty-five weekly periods or
more, while but fifteen per cent of the programs taken by the older students were as
heavy. Among the men alone the younger students have actually a slight advantage.
At Kirksville, Warrensburg, and Maryville the proportion permitted to take excess
hours is so small — two or three per cent — that the figures signify little. At Cape
Girardeau, however, where the restrictions that hedge excessive student programs at
the other schools had not been applied, fifty-nine per cent of the over-age men take
twenty-five hours or more, as compared with sixty-seven per cent among the men
under nineteen. Among the women the balance is reversed, but the difference is small.
At Springfield eleven per cent of the older take twenty-five hours or more as against
nine per cent of the younger. In the summer session, however, a number of capable,
ambitious, and experienced teachers appear and take all the credit available; hence
the older students outdo the younger by several points on programs of twenty-five
hours or more — Cape Girardeau : twenty-five to fourteen per cent; Springfield : twelve
to four per cent. These facts, if typical, may warrant the conclusion that the older sec-
ondary students in the regular session are on the whole a duller group, possibly some-
what parasitic on the school in their efforts to get a better job, and probably worthy
of less attention than has heretofore been given them. Studies of student performance
at both Columbia and Harvard Universities would make this inference appear reason-
able.1 The summer session, on the contrary, deals with a mature but selected group
of workers stimulated by a sharper vocational motive.
TREATMENT OF THE YOUNG SECONDARY STUDENT
The wide differences in age among secondary students seem to offer ample justi-
fication for distinguishing treatment. Regarding the younger group, there can be no
difference of reasonable opinion : students of this early age should at once be returned
to the high schools nearest their homes, and be required to finish the course there
before coming to the normal school.2 A high school senior twenty years of age is not
hopelessly out of place, tho he be two years behind the schedule, Taking the second-
ary enrolment of 1913-14 as a basis, and including half of those who are nineteen or
twenty, we would have about forty-five per cent or, roughly, seventeen hundred stu-
dents to be returned to high schools — an increase of only five per cent in the total
attendance at first class high schools in that year. Slightly over two thousand students
would remain to be otherwise provided for.
The course here suggested is advisable first of all for the sake of its effect upon the
normal school in eliminating an element of immaturity that under modern conditions
1 Recent information gathered by the Director of Admissions at Columbia shows clearly that the younger students
do the better work, the grade diminishing1 steadily and consistently with increased age. The same results appeared
at Harvard with the additional discovery of decreased liability to college censure among young students.
2 In the case of students Hying at a distance from high schools, it is recognized that such a measure could not fairly
be undertaken without statutory provision for free tuition, to be paid by the county, in the high school most accessi-
ble. This step, however, is long overdue in Missouri from every educational and democratic point of view.
PROBLEM OF THE SECONDARY STUDENT £99
has no place there, and that at present seriously diverts the energy and attention of
both teachers and students from the one professional aim of the institution. The most
obvious way to emphasize the collegiate and professional character of the institution
is to turn over all secondary work to its own natural agents, the high schools, or if
necessary to a third agency, as indicated below. In the second place it is cheaper to
educate students of this grade in the schools that are intended for them. It is both
absolutely cheaper in money, and it would be a relief to the state, since the expense of
such secondary instruction would be borne locally either by the county or by the dis-
trict. Local institutions are already fully organized, but are usually small, and these
students could be distributed among them with relatively slight increase in cost while
the saving at the normal schools would be considerable.
A further consideration is fundamental. The secondary schools of Missouri have an
educational right to the support and recognition that such a policy would supply. In
going over the state, the enquiry staff found numerous cases of complaint on the
part of high school officers that the normal schools repeatedly drew oif their students,
either altogether or shortly before graduation, by enabling them to take a heavier
program or to combine college and high school work and thus eventually to save
time. This telescoping procedure has been a normal school practice of long standing,
and is part of the tendency to over-speeding that has been the chief cause for friction
with the state department and other crediting agencies. It is but justice to the sec-
ondary school in its effort to provide a deliberate and thorough education, to require
the sanction of its graduation before admitting one of its students, and the weaker
the school, the greater the reason for sustaining its claims if its work is to be recog-
nized at all. Each high school can easily provide examinations whereby capable stu-
dents may hasten their work; it should not be made a victim of a process that demor-
alizes its senior class in the interests of another institution.
It may be objected that for some students the physical difficulty of attending dis-
tant high schools is too serious to be considered. This is certainly a habit of thought
rather than a matter of fact. Many high schools both in Missouri and in other states
have considerable colonies of students drawn in for the week from the neighboring
country. The high school at Ava, in Douglas County, Missouri, is an excellent ex-
ample of an isolated but thoroughly modern school serving the whole surrounding
region in this manner. With its teacher-training class it constitutes a miniature normal
school for the district, and renders a service that could be duplicated at will in any
similar locality. So long as secondary students are allowed to teach at all, they should
be prepared at these distributed training centres, where good student material is avail-
able from which a selection can be made, thus in turn strengthening the high school
itself for its local purpose.1
1 The problem of housing and supervising: young" students in a high school town need be no more difficult than at the
present normal schools. Only one of the latter has even partial dormitory arrangements, the students everywhere oc-
cupying rooms secured in the several neighborhoods. Segregation of boys and girls and approval of rooming houses
300 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
SPECIAL NEEDS OF THE OLDER SECONDARY STUDENT
On the other hand, would-be students who have reached the age of nineteen with-
out attending a secondary school, or who may have attended for a year or two and
then have taught for a series of years, constitute a different problem altogether. For
such people the ordinary high school does not make suitable provision : its student
body is too youthful for comfortable association, and its processes, if not unnecessarily
slow, are unsuited to the older group; furthermore the presence of much older and
more experienced minds of low attainment reacts harmfully upon younger students.
For such belated, tho often capable and worthy individuals, the middle western nor-
mal school has, from its beginning, been a haven of refuge. The completeness with
which large numbers of these candidates have disappeared and been assimilated within
its frequently enormous bulk is the clearest testimony to its formlessness. Instead of
preparing selected material in the best possible way for a fixed purpose, it has been
intent upon giving each individual, for his own sake, a vocational opportunity to
fill any teaching niche that might offer, regardless of whether he took one term or a
dozen to prepare for it; and it has utilized for this purpose, usually in good faith, the
various time-saving devices elsewhere described. Under rural and pioneer conditions
this was a necessary and welcome service, but as social requirements have become defi-
nite and specialized, the emphasis in professional matters has inevitably changed from
the mere welfare of the individual to the quality of the service that he is prepared
to render the community; he is selected, trained, tested, and inspected, not to ensure
him a successful career as a breadwinner, but to guarantee his proper performance for
the sake of others, and professional institutions should be most insistent in upholding
this view. In so far as the selection of material has been concerned, conditions have
been improving rapidly in Missouri, particularly since 1914 ; collegiate students are
much more carefully separated than formerly from those who lack complete entrance
qualifications. It remains to provide in some adequate manner for the large number
of mature students, usually already teachers of some experience, who have not satis-
fied these requirements.
A STATE HIGH SCHOOL
An essential feature of a provision for this purpose should be its distinctness of
organization; a school for such people should stand as separate and apart from the
normal schools as from the regular high schools; it should have a completely separate
staff, separate buildings, and, if possible, a separate location ; it should be in session
the year round; it should be as free to adapt itself to its peculiar function as is any
other state institution, and should aim to provide for mature secondary students pre-
paring not only for normal schools but for the university, as well as supplying high
school opportunities for any adult students who may not wish to continue their edu-
is usually required by the schools, but at Springfield, a city of forty thousand population, not even this is demanded.
A good high school administration could easily develop a system of control at least equally satisfactory.
ORGANIZATION OF ATTENDANCE 301
cation beyond that point. Such institutions would be nothing other than state high
schools taking their warrant from the analogy of the state university. These could be
easily organized, for the present, in connection with certain of the normal schools, by
effecting a rigid separation, as regards staff, program, and attendance, between the
students in the normal school proper and all secondary students over twenty years of
age, no younger applicants being admitted unless clearly unsuited to high school
membership. It is probable that the demand for such institutions would diminish1
considerably as higher requirements for teachers' certificates were made universal by
law throughout the state. They might then be reduced in number, possibly to one,
having a central location and accessible from all directions. A plan of this kind would
furnish a practicable and congenial arrangement whereby older and retarded students
could recover their handicap to the best advantage, and whereby really valuable and
ambitious minds could be saved to the state without prejudice to a sound organization
of the normal schools.
3. Organization of Attendance'21
THE PROBLEM OF NORMAL SCHOOL ATTENDANCE
The historical circumstances out of which the present problem of attendance at
the Missouri normal schools has arisen have already been described.3 It will be re-
membered that the schools were started at a time when formal training for teaching
was all but completely lacking in the state, and that they were kept alive, often by
desperate effort, for a public largely, apathetic or openly hostile. Their leaders were
quasi-missionaries. Their aims were two-fold: they sought, on the one hand, to at-
tract and interest boys and girls in education, and on the other, to justify their own
existence before a critical legislature that could be impressed chiefly by size. They
were independent, autonomous organizations actuated by a generous rivalry. Given
1 The actual as well as relative number of secondary students at the schools is apparently diminishing with great
rapidity. Springfield reports (Catalogue, 1917-18) 864 secondary students out of 1797 or 48 per cent as compared with
1207 or 63 per cent in 1913-14. Kirksville gives her proportions in 1916-17 as 20 per cent, which would be about 337
(Catalogue, 1917, page 18) as compared with 805 or 54 per cent in 1913-14, but it is not clear how this figure was reached.
When the records of this school were studied, it was found to be im possible to ascertain the real classification of large
numbers of students. To the question as to how the report required by the state superintendent was compiled, the
reply was given that the numbers were "estimated by the membership in various representative classes or in other
ways." It is noteworthy that these reports from Kirksville are uniformly in round numbers^When it is recalled that
this school has frequently made up its secondary units in connection with attendance on " college " classes, it will
be seen that the chancefor error in this method of reckoning is high. The figures used in this study were arrived at
by an examination of each student's program — an obviously unsatisfactory method, but the only one available in
the absence of a definite classification based upon the amount and character of secondary work completed.
2 Development of the Calendar. From the establishment of the First District Normal School at Kirksville, in 1871,
until 1904, all of the schools observed a thirty-eight or forty-week, two-semester calendar, with each semester sub-
divided into two terms. Meanwhile the summer session appeared. Started at Warrensburg in 1894 as a private
undertaking of the faculty, it was formally taken over by the regents in 1900. Summer sessions were inaugurated at
Kirksville in 1890 and at Cape Girardeau in 1897. Springfield and Maryviile opened their careers with summer ses-
sions in 1906. These special sessions of the school, at first but six weeks in length, quickly became popular as an
effective substitute for the earlier form of teachers* "institute" — an improvised three or four week normal centre
conducted for the training of teachers in service. The superiority of the summer session for that purpose finally
became so apparent that in 1904 the calendar was altered from a semester to a term basis, and the summer session
was included as the fourth twelve-week term of the regular school year. It has gradually shrunk to a ten-week
term, at first with compensating work on Saturdays and later without this equivalent Credit is, however, main-
tained at the fall amount.
8 See pages 36-41.
302 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
such premises,, a certain type of organization follows almost of necessity. Every ap-
plicant must be admitted at any time without inconvenience or disadvantage to him-
self; it must be possible, in turn, for a student to drop out at any point, likewise
without disadvantage to himself, except for the actual loss of time while absent.
Such a policy is clearly most gratifying to the student, and to his parents and his
friends in the community;1 it gains support for the schools, and is the policy best cal-
culated to increase attendance.
EDUCATIONAL EFFECTS OF THE PRESENT SYSTEM
Educationally this policy has certain very definite implications. It makes a curricu-
lum organized for a purpose and followed in sequence impossible; or at least it places
a very high premium upon an indiscriminate or loosely grouped elective system for
the sake of ease in administration. The larger the number of short, interchangeable
units, the more easily can programs be made up and irregular students accommo-
dated. The consequent results are bad. Ten new students report for the second term
of a history, literature, or science sequence. If fairly treated, and certainly if they
constitute a majority of the class, they must have the general aims and setting of the
course repeated; instructions about study, reading, or gathering material must be
gone over a second time, and the new students must be broken into possibly new habits
of work while the others mark time. Worst of all, the earlier course is of no assistance
to the later course in the minds of the newcomers, and if these are to progress with-
out it, those who have taken the earlier work must lose what is rightfully theirs. The
teacher must forego allusion to earlier comment, situation, or example. To handle
the year's work as a whole is like discussing a play with an audience half of which
has missed the first two acts. All thought of the larger development and coherence of
the material is therefore dropped, and the work of the course resolves itself solely
into what can be seen within the limits of that particular ten or twelve week term, as
tho teacher and student had never met before. The class is always starting again and
never accumulates the real momentum which is the chief result of prolonged coop-
eration by teacher and class.
Aside from this impoverishing effect on instruction, the system is wasteful. Classes
are repeated from term to term for small groups that in an organized curriculum
would have but one place for that subject, and that in a sequence in which it in-
terpreted its predecessor and prepared the way for work to come. Further, such a vari-
ety of subjects being available, it is easy for students to form the habit of dropping
one subject for another thru sheer caprice — convenience of program, presence of
friends, popular teachers, and so forth — even tho they do not leave the school. On the
other hand, it not infrequently happens that when the two or three parts of a sub-
ject are given during the same term by this system, a student will enroll in both or all.
1 "We have students entering- at almost all seasons, and we undertake to adapt ourselves to the necessities of the
communities which we serve," KirlcsviUe Catalogue, 1903, page 26i
ORGANIZATION OF ATTENDANCE 303
A student commencing English, history may be introduced by three separate begin-
nings at one time. Indirectly the procedure cheapens the whole institution. It virtually
begs the student to "drop in at any time," and such an opportunity does not command
respect. Any student appreciates more keenly the organization that requires an ad-
justment on his part, even to the point of some sacrifice, if it is plainly to his larger
interest. A person who attends a college or university willingly adapts himself to the
prerequisites and sequences that are demanded, even in a general course, and tradi-
tionally takes the full curriculum or at least an unbroken year ; his experiences repre-
sent a coherent development. The graduate of this type of normal school, on the con-
trary, thinks of his work not in large, significant wholes, but in unrelated fragments
heaped up at last to the proper height. Such normal schools can hardly object to
being advertised by their one- term students when their curricula are but a medley
of one-term courses to be picked up, dropped, or intermingled at will.1
There is but one favorable thing that may be said of this organization for the tran-
sient student. It supplies a hand-to-mouth education for the student who must lead
a hand-to-mouth existence. Under pioneer conditions such students are many, and
are too precious to ignore. But the time comes when the demand for teachers with
thorough preparation outweighs every other concern, and then these erstwhile bene-
ficiaries should be provided for otherwise, while the normal school moves ahead on
its proper path.
The Missouri normal schools are acute sufferers from the system described above.
About half of the teachers conducting sequences of two or more terms2 (seventy-
seven) still report appreciable changes in the membership of classes at the end of
each term.3 They very generally condemn this practice, tho a few have evidently be-
come so used to it as to see no disadvantage, and two actually commend it. Typical
criticisms are: " Class held back/' "Prevents consecutive work," "Harder for stu-
dent/'"Much ground retraced/' "Student fails, or succeeds at expense of teacher/'
" Confusion, waste, duplication of work," "Destroys interest, lowers standards," "Per-
fect pandemonium/5 " New students a drag; no continuity." One teacher considers it
a bore to have "absolute constant membership"! At some schools a considerable
change occurs even in the middle of the term; especially in the spring when teachers
come in after the close of their schools. Cape Girardeau teachers note this in eleven
cases, and a class in Ancient History was visited there to which had just been added
eight students wholly ignorant of the first six weeks' work.4 At Warrensburg and
1 The normal school- catalogues contain so many warnings against the Imposition of the pseudo-normal student (that
is one of brief attendance) that the danger of misrepresentation must have been considerable. With a curriculum
nothing: but arope of sand, however, it is hard to see how this can well be avoided. The school's only protection is an
organized and continuous course- before a license to teach can be had.
2 The reason more sequences are not reported is the best of evidence of the conditions described. AtMaryville, for
example, these prevail to such an extent that true sequences in courses from term to term are no longer attempted.
8 " Elementary Education, twenty-six entered, ten withdrew." " Algebra I, IT and in, less than 5 per cent continued
thru ; 50-75 per cent new each term." " Rhetoric and American Literature drops 27 per cent end of first term and adds
18 per cent; English Literature drops 35 per cent and adds 31 per cent." These are typical reports.
* These were applicants for "approved grades." They were admitted to a beginning class six weeks ahead of them,
and at the same time and in the same subject to an advanced class six weeks ahead of them. At the en d of the quarter
304 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
Mary ville this apparently does not happen. At all of the schools individual students
appear to be admitted to classes at almost any time. " Students enter anywhere from
first day to first eight weeks," says one primary English teacher9 and she proceeds to
state how she fills up the time until the class is collected.
CHANGES IN STFDENT BODY FROM TEEM TO TERM
About one-eighth of the students leave after the fall quarter and are replaced by
a new sixth. After the winter term more than one- fourth leave and two-fifths enter
or reenter. From spring to summer one-half remain, while one hundred thirty per
cent more come in. This shift is much more pronounced among the secondary stu-
dents than among the collegiate students, especially after the winter term. The latter
have already developed considerable stability of attendance. Omitting the "spring
only" and "spring and summer" collegiate students, inasmuch as they are chiefly
teachers who come in after their short-term schools have closed, there remain one
thousand two hundred sixty-nine collegiate attendants at the regular fall, winter,
and spring sessions, and of these three-fourths are found staying thru either three*
or all four quarters. These figures are for the total enrolment of 1913-14. Approx-
imately the same result appears in a study of the attendance at four schools1 when
visited in 1915. A group was made up which comprised all those who had attended
three terms or more in the collegiate department. These numbered four hundred sev-
enty-three, and seven-tenths of them had made at least three terms of their collegiate
work consecutive.2 This is most encouraging in view of the proposal for a fixed and
regular session. Add to these such students as could accommodate their plans if the
school were to require it, and we would have an impressive showing.
SEQUENCE OF YEARS
The question of sequence of attendance from year to year is another important but,
for the present, less critical problem. It is possible for students to omit a year's at-
tendance, while they recoup their finances, without seriously disturbing the work of
the institution. Experience in itself is doubtless a benefit, tho when this is lacking
in wise direction, its value falls comparatively low. The chief objection lies in the
educational malpractice whereby these partly schooled students are turned out on
small, remote, and therefore helpless communities. As soon as fitting legislation makes
they entered the regular beginning class for the first six weeks' work and the regular advanced class for the six weeks
omitted there. At the end of this second six weeks they received credit for two full quarters of ancient history. Surely
"adjustment to the needs of the individual" could go no further. The practice was admitted to be very bad* but it
*' could not be helped " — except, of course, by not doing- it.This is an excellent illustration of the tendency to cheapen
the instruction provided for secondary pupils whose numbers ensure the appropriations, in order to build up expen-
sive advanced classes for a few students. Had one of these eight applied for advanced Latin, an instructor would at
once have been assigrnedeven for his sole benefit.
1 Data not secured from Warrensburg.
2 The secondary students for whom the same facts could be obtained numbered 346. Of these 43 per cent had not had
three consecutive terms in their normal school attendance thus far,' tho all had had at least three terms at the school.
The relief to the school by the elimination of these term-at-a-time secondary students would be considerable.
ORGANIZATION OF ATTENDANCE 305
this impossible, the problem will disappear. Students expecting to teach will be obliged
to provide for their training otherwise than by imposing upon undiscerning school
boards. In the group of collegiate students last referred to in the preceding paragraph
were one hundred fifty-five who had taken six terms or more of collegiate work. Of
these, eleven per cent had done their work in two separated periods of three consec-
utive terms each, sixteen per cent had taken one such period and the remainder of
their work in scattered terms, only one per cent took no three terms together, wiiile
seventy-two per cent had taken all six terms consecutively. Here again is convincing
evidence that the collegiate department at least is ripe for a coherent organization.
NEED OF CENTRAL ADMINISTRATION AND FAVORABLE LEGISLATION
The participants in the enquiry are strongly of the opinion that the regulations
governing attendance at the normal schools of Missouri should be revised. The ques-
tion is closely interwoven with that of the curricula, and on the treatment of these
two vital factors will hang the verdict as to whether the normal schools are to be
leaders in the moulding of teachers or mere followers in the path of least resistance
marked out by popular fancy.
It will be very much more difficult for the normal schools to do the things that
should be done if they continue to stand apart than it will be if they centralize their
administration, and are thus enabled to share responsibility. As separate schools they
are dependent on their local constituencies; as representative arms of a centralized
state function, however, they can enforce policies that are right from the higher point
of view of the state, unaffected by local prejudice. Favorable legislation likewise would
be of immense assistance. The third grade certificate should be abolished ; this would
place all preparation for teaching in Missouri on at least a high school basis, and
those who go no farther should of course be required to attend the training classes.1
This, too, would enable the normal schools more readily to dispense with their sec-
ondary departments, as elsewhere suggested. Furthermore, if all cities having a pop-
ulation of five thousand or more were required to employ only such elementary teach-
ers as had at least two years of professional training in advance of the high school,
the task of the normal schools would at once become definite and authoritative. It is
difficult for schools to maintain standard requirements when any student may leave
at any point in the course because of an offer to teach that cuts under his training.
Such legislative cooperation would aid the normal schools greatly in discharging the
task that the state has put into their hands. Broken attendance is much more charac-
teristic of the secondary than of the collegiate group, and if the former department
were eliminated and a clear goal set for at least part of the collegiate courses, a sound
development would be assured.
1 So far from this step, the Missouri Legislature of 1917 took the unaccountable action of making the third grade
certificate renewable once without examination. It could previously be acquired four times by successive annual
examinations; with four examinations and the four renewals, therefore, the present arrangement gives virtually
an eight-year teaching permit to persons who are wholly unfit.
806 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
OPPORTUNITY OF THE SCHOOLS FOR INDEPENDENT ACTION
Nevertheless, even without such help, the schools have it in their power to bring
about radical changes for the better solely thru their own initiative. Definite, three-
term curricula for the most needed objectives should be laid out in common by all
the schools and adhered to, no student being admitted at any point who has not fully
satisfied the preceding requirements. There is undoubtedly a large body of students
ready to take an exclusive curriculum of this sort, and it may be safely predicted
that most of those who now enter and withdraw irregularly would accommodate
themselves to such a requirement if it were necessary. As long as the school continues
to sacrifice its coherence to the putative "necessities" of the students, one may be
sure that the latter will take full advantage of their opportunities. Even the stu-
dents themselves, however, prefer the other system and think it feasible. When asked
as to the merits of saving funds for a year's continuous attendance versus the quar-
terly interchange of teaching and study, ninety-four per cent of the students declared
that the first was wiser. And when asked whether that plan was practicable for most
student-teachers, nearly three-fourths voted that it was.1 The normal school teachers
were not nearly so confident on this latter point as were the students. Two-thirds of
those teachers replying from Warrensburg and all but one from Maryville believed
that consecutive attendance on the part of the.great majority of the students was
practicable, but at Cape Girardeau one-half, at Springfield two-thirds, and at Kirks-
ville three-quarters of them were of the opposite opinion.2 The discount in these ex-
pressions, both of students and of teachers, must probably be made from the objectors
as most likely to be influenced by the situation with which they are familiar. It is cer-
tainly difficult to see why a student, especially one of collegiate status, could not teach
longer and save money for a year's work instead of coming only for six months or for
a single quarter.
It is, of course, the regular session that one would like to see at once made contin-
uous; the summer session should provide as now for teachers for whom a continuous
year's work maybe out of the question, until the elimination of low grade certificates
may reduce this need. But here, also, the work should be organized in sequence in
effective curricula, even tho the advantage of consecutive attendance would have to
be sacrificed. It would be a simple matter, for example, to offer the successive quarters
of a two-year curriculum in succeeding summers, thus making it possible for a teacher
in one full year and three summers to complete the course. At the same time dupli-
, cation could be avoided, except in so far as might be actually necessary to handle the
numbers, by arranging to distribute the work of different quarters among the schools.
To be assured of finding the particular quarterns work needed complete at some school
in the state would be a sufficiently reasonable provision for the irregular student at
1 The Questions were asked at Maryville, Warrensburg1, and Kirksville. Twelve hundred sixteen, or 94 per cent of
those reporting, voted for the first proposition, and 775, or 70 per cent of those reporting, voted for the second.
2 At Kirksville, however, 96 per cent of the students voted in favor of consecutive sessions and 76 percent for their
practicability.
ADMISSION AND CLASSIFICATION OF STUDENTS 307
the summer sessions. This naturally presupposes intimate cooperation between the
schools on a carefully worked-out plan.
4. Admission and Classification
a. REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION
Conditions of admission to the normal schools in Missouri are determined partly
by law and partly by the regulations of the various boards of regents. The law
of 1870 establishing the first two normal schools permitted the board to require a
declaration on the part of each entering student that it was his intention to teach
in the public schools of the state.1 This requirement was made compulsory in 1879,2
and is still in force.3 Such declaration is usually incorporated in some information or
registration blank that the student is required to sign as a whole. The provision is
thus technically satisfied without giving it what in some cases would be unwelcome
prominence. Maryville does not require the declaration at all. In the catalogues War-
rensburg alone gives it due emphasis ; the others omit all reference to it. To meet the
obvious intent of the law, a separate signature on a duly specific and formal blank
should be demanded, and notice of the requirement should be given in each catalogue.
Candidly interpreted, the declaration is a genuine and important condition of admis-
sion, and when duly emphasized, may furnish valuable moral support to a school
that seeks to concentrate its effort. The experience of Warrensburg is ample evi-
dence of this.
REGULATIONS OF LOCAL BOARDS
The single board in charge of the first two schools set up certain further condi-
tions. The first was an age limit of seventeen years for boys and fifteen years for girls,
with the understanding that in case the student agreed to take the full course, he
would be admitted one year earlier.4 These age limits underwent various fluctua-
tions in the several schools, soon (1876) dropping to fourteen for both boys and girls,
and later rising to fifteen and sixteen. At present the matter of age scarcely enters
into consideration, the question being one of articulation with the elementary school.
The only other original entrance provision of importance was an educational quali-
fication stated to be aan examination as for a second grade county certificate1"15 — at
that time the lowest teaching certificate in use, and equivalent at best to the require-
ments of the eighth elementary grade. The manner of the enforcement of this second
requirement deserves special consideration.
1 Laws of Missouri, 1870, page 186, section 10.
2 Revised Statutes, 1879, section 7167. * 1918.
4 Stale Report, 1871. pa^e 139. 6 Ibid.
308 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
EXAMINATION versus "PROVING UP"
Whatever the prerequisite to regular membership in a Missouri normal school, it
is improbable that any student, otherwise acceptable, was ever refused admission to
the institutions on account of deficient scholarship. For extremely backward students
a " sub-normal" or elementary department with courses of varying length appears to
have done duty throughout the first thirty years. Nevertheless, during this early period
admission to the normal school proper was guarded by an examination demanded of
all, — at least, of all those who had not already been examined for a teacher's certifi-
cate. Provision for such an examination appears in some form in practically all of the
catalogues until 1900.1 Meanwhile the few applicants holding advanced standing from
colleges and seminaries,2 and later those coming from the high schools as they devel-
oped, were admitted with due credit for work already done, but the difficulty of esti-
mating the precise value of such work brought from every variety of institution led
to a practice that has since wrought havoc in the institutions. Examination of such
a student was waived out of deference to his " grades,3' but to test its worth the credit
was not formally accepted until the student had " shown that he could do satisfac-
tory work" in the classes where such credit placed him? and it became the general
custom, as a matter of precaution, to defer even the record of the advanced credit
until shortly before graduation.3 Experience has taught other higher institutions that
this policy is disastrous. A scheme that makes a large material advantage to the stu-
dent contingent upon his performance in a single course puts an enormous strain upon
the personal equation of both teachers and administrators. A wise policy reduces this
to a minimum; the teacher's task in fairly judging a student's deserts in his own
course alone is delicate enough, without weighting the scale with a whole series of other
consequences. It would seem to have been a better plan to keep on requiring examina-
tions until the institutions whose credits could be trusted were recognized, and then to
accept credit from them unconditionally. If students from schools holding this privi-
lege made poor records, the school could then be deprived of the certificate privilege,
and its students be again required to take examinations; in any case the status of any
given student would always be settled. Elsewhere this plan has worked to the mutual
satisfaction of schools and students. Certain efforts were made in this direction by
utilizing the "approved list " of high schools drawn up by the state university, but
the other method seemed plausible as well as more simple ; it was certainly far more
1 The following announcements are typical : " The first Monday of each term will be devoted to examination for
admission to the different classes. After examination, students are assigned to the classes which they are qualified
to enter." Catalogue, JZirJcsville, 1879, page 18. "Students are admitted to any term or year on examination," Cata-
logue, Warrensburg, 1889, page 23. "The preliminary examination for admittance to the normal classes is both
oral and written. Students will be admitted to any class upon passing a satisfactory examination in the preceding
studies of the course.'1 Catalogue, Cape Girardeau, 1897, page 7.
2 Reference to these begins in the catalogue of 1882 at Warrensburg, and in 1885 at Kirksville.
8 Thus: "Grades accepted by the departments will not be placed on the general record until the last term of the
year in which the student expects to graduate." Catalogue, Warrensburg, 1899, page 14. See similar statement,
Catalogue* KirJcsville, 1897, page 28.
ADMISSION AND CLASSIFICATION OF STUDENTS 309
agreeable to the student to be released from examinations, and the policy was soon
generally adopted.1
The decade beginning with 1900 brought rapid expansion and reorganization. Since
1882 Warrensburg, and probably the other schools, had allowed high school gradu-
ates to finish the course in one year.2 In 1899 Warrensburg increased her requirements
to two years,3 for graduates of approved first class high schools, and in 1904? this was
agreed to by the others. According to the plan of this agreement, more time was to
be required of graduates from second and third class schools, and applicants from
unapproved schools not holding teachers' certificates were to be examined; Kirks ville,
however, reserved the right to assign any credentials whatever value she chose without
examination.4
REORGANIZATION OF THE SECONDARY PROGRAM
After 1904 a student who went thru high school required six years beyond the
eighth grade to obtain his normal school diploma, while students who went to the nor-
mal school directly from the eighth grade could combine their secondary and profes-
sional studies, and finish both in four or five years' time ; and large numbers did so. The
next problem, therefore, was to convert this old four-year normal school curriculum
into a six-year curriculum requiring as much from students who attended the normal
school only as from those who first completed high school. This duty was not frankly
faced. It could have been well discharged in one of two ways : either by adding two
years of genuine collegiate and professional work to the old secondary curriculum, or
by pushing up the old course and building in two good years of secondary work at
the bottom. Neither alternative was followed; the old curriculum was indeed advanced
by two years, but instead of requiring new work below it, the old "sub-normal" en-
trance requirements were transferred bodily to this uncertain gap between the ele-
mentary school and the old curriculum which had been thus advanced.
The same eighth grade subjects were covered, a little more intensively to be sure,
in one or two semesters, so that any mature youth could fill out irregularities in his
1 " Graduates of High Schools, approved by the Missouri State University, will be admitted to advanced standing
without examination." "Applicants for advanced standing- who have done work out of school under the instruc-
tion of competent teachers may be given credit for such work, but the faculty will reserve the right to examine,"
etc. Catalogue, Cape Girardeau, 1902, page 12.
** Graduates from High Schools and Academies enumerated in the Approved List' of the university will be ad-
mitted to classification on presenting certificates of graduation, but before final credit is given the student must
establish his claim by satisfactory work. The usual entrance examinations are for classification only. In lieu of these
a candidate for admission must present a valid certificate of any grade, or recent standings from any good school."
Catalogue, Warrensburg 1894, pages 24 if. Reference to the "approved list" of the university was omitted in the
next catalogue,
" Grades furnished from Colleges, High Schools, and Academies will be accepted by heads of departments after
the students presenting the same have shown approved proficiency in similar studies." Catalogue, Kirksville, 1894,
page 16.
2 Apparently Warrensburg alone made definite provisions for such students in a special curriculum.
2 Catalogue, 1899, page 12,
4 After stating the terms of the agreement, the Kirksville catalogue proceeds : " But this Institution prefers to ad-
mit and classify all students on the evidences of scholarship furnished by their grade cards, certificates, diplomas,
etc., and without examination We therefore seek to make rules of classification so flexible as to recognise fully
the merits of each school and each individual student" Catalogue, Kirksville, 1904, page 18.
810 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
elementary schooling, and still count it all as secondary work.1 This case of appar-
ently bad faith with the high schools, the best of which were now requiring in their
first year a full program of secondary work in algebra, ancient history, Latin, and so
forth, — almost exactly the same as the first year of the regular normal program two
years beyond, — had an explanation that should not be overlooked, tho it hardly
justifies the course taken. Most of the students coming to the normal schools were
attending but a few terms in order to obtain teaching privileges, and were not bent
on following out a complete curriculum.2 For them good review courses were essential.
The better students who did go on, however, especially those who had taught, passed
over these "review" courses hurriedly, and after a few weeks' work to "prove up""
presently found themselves in possession of a mass of credits representing half of a
high school curriculum, but leaving no corresponding deposit in their education. It
would have been better for the schools at this point either not to have counted such
work for secondary credit, or else to have created real professional courses of such a
nature as to require the attendance of all who had not actually taken them.3
"PROVING UP" POLICY ESTABLISHED
"Entrance requirements" were thus all but completely swallowed up in the reor-
ganized secondary program. Examinations for admission disappeared,4 and "proving
1 The school at Kirksville, after trying in vain to merge its " sub-normal " course with the eighth grade of its " Model
School" (Catalogue, 1901, page 27), solves the problem thus in 1902 (Catalogue, page 18): "Sub-normal Course. A thor-
ough and systematic teachers' course in the subjects that all teachers must know. One class in arithmetic, rigorous,
searching1, thorough, old-fashioned mental and written arithmetic. One good thorough-going grammar class [etc.,
etc., for history, civil government, and physiology]. It is not an ordinary course. It is not by ordinary men. It is not
eighth grade work" (Our italics.) But the English department in the same catalogue (page 32) states that this gram-
mar class is for "all who are deficient " precisely as it did in the years before when it was clearly eighth grade work
(Catalogue, 1901, page 20).
2 The importance of these first two years for low grade teachers is evident from the Rural Certificate Course, which
until 1916 required nothing further.
8 The two-year gap existing after 1900 between the elementary school and the normal school curriculum was first con-
sistently filled at Warrensburg in 1909, by inserting two years of English, algebra and geometry, ancient and mod-
ern history, foreign language or science Kirksville since 1908 has scheduled two years' work, of which the first con-
sisted of "common school subjects" repeated. Cape Girardeau in 1908 adopted a secondary course of fifteen units
including the same review courses. Springfield did the same with fourteen units, raised to fifteen the next year. And
Maryville in 1911 laid out two full years' work for a " Common School Certificate" — a mixture of reviews with high
school and professional work.
* The evolution at Kirksville is interesting ; significant points are italicised.
Catalogue, 1899, page 14: ""All persons applying for admission to the Sub-Normal School course shall be subjected
to a thorough examination in,'* etc (five subjects). " All persons applying for admission to the Normal School proper
shall be subjected to a thorough examination in all subjects of the sub-normal school course and no person whose
average falls below 60% shall be admitted to either."
Ibid,, page 10: "MINUTES OF THE BOARD OF REGENTS, June 15, 1899. Standing obtained recently in High Schools,
Academies, and Colleges on the approved list of the State University will be accepted by this institution, after
satisfactory examination in any one subject agreed upon by the applicant and the President of this institution."
Catalogue, 1900, page 36: "Standing obtained recently in High Schools, Academies and Colleges on the approved
list of the University will be accepted by this institution." "All students are requested to bring with them their
grade cards, certificates, diplomas and other documents showing their standing in schools heretofore attended by
them." (No 'mention of an entrance examination occurs In the catalogue.)
Catalogue* 1901, page 43 : " Bring all your grade cards, certificates and diplomas." " Avoid examinations by bring-
ing: these credentials." "Examinations on entering a school are as worrisome to the Faculty and President as they
are to the student."
Catalogue, 1902, page 8: "If the students maintain themselves creditably in the advanced work , . . the grades
brought from other institutions are approved."
Bulletin, December, 1902, page 5: (This plan) "simply places every student on his own merits. ... It gives each
student opportunity to graduate in the shortest possible time." "We desire [page 6] to avoid the labor, annoyance
ADMISSION AND CLASSIFICATION OF STUDENTS 311
up" became the standard procedure. By this system credentials, of course, lose their
importance, and are neglected in proportion to the extent to which it is proposed
to rely upon a student's class work. Warrensburg alone appears to demand and file
specific original credentials for all grades allowed.1 All of the schools follow the prac-
tice of admitting and classifying the student on his own representations, and not until
he becomes definitely a candidate for a certificate or diploma are his papers asked
for even at the schools that require them for graduation. In granting advanced stand-
ing, none of the normal schools, save Warrensburg, appears to distinguish effectively
between approved and unapproved high schools as rated by the state superintendent.
When such distinction is made, the tendency is to discount more or less the total
amount of unapproved credit without reference to individual subjects. Thus eight
units from an unapproved school may be cut down to six to penalize the school, but
no notice will be taken of the student's deficient preparation in the subjects studied.
UNIFORM ADMINISTRATION OF ADMISSION REQUIREMENTS NEEDED
The experience of the normal schools in the administration of their en trance require-
ments contains some instructive suggestions. In the first place it is clearly impossi-
ble to arrive at a satisfactory method of procedure without cooperation, either volun-
tary or enforced. To have one of five state schools that exist to do the same work ad-
vertise admission by examination and another offer to take any one "on his merits,"
otherwise determined, while the policies of the rest range somewhere between, is de-
moralizing. It shakes public confidence in the integrity of the system, and it leads to
evasion and equivocation in the institution. School authorities that would have been
glad to follow the rating of the state superintendent freely admitted that it was
impossible " because the others don't do it." No one knows exactly what the "others1**
do, but suspicion and rumor, together with the tales of migrant students, keep a tangle
and embarrassment of examinations. Where a student has no school credentials, a letter from some well-known
teacher or other person connected with schools will be helpful."
Thus the "merit system ** was firmly established and " No Examinations" became a headline attraction in the
prospectus (Bulletin, March, 1906, page 4). From this time on, students from any source were welcomed at Kirksville
and "proved up" by placing- them where they claimed to belong- regardless of credentials, and if they could "do
the work," — that is, if they could get a passing mark, — earlier claims, often even of a dissimilar character, were
validated.
Cape Girardeau adopted the same plan, more reservedly, but no less effectively:
Catalogue, 1904, page 12: " Other applicants for admission may be admitted by examination, or on presentation
of such other evidences ... as the faculty may require."
Catalogue, 1905, page 15: Same statement, omitting reference to examinations.
Catalogue, 1908, page 21 (referring to students without credentials) : "The usual practice is to classify a student as
seems best after looking- carefully into his work done in other schools before entering the normal school. An entrance
examination is not usually required."
In the catalogue of 1914 reference is made to "completion of an eight-grade school, or work of equivalent value,"
as a minimum requirement, but allusion follows to possible " conditions** and no mention is made of examinations.
Springfield, from its establishment in 1906, accepted and practised the Kirksville doctrine ; ** without examina-
tion" is the only formula contained in its bulletins.
Warrensburg alone, of the five schools, has maintained in its bulletins a clear and consistent examination require-
ment for such work as could not be certified on the basis of state (specified in full after 1908) approval. Its procedure
with students lacking even elementary school diplomas has been much the same as in the other schools.
Maryville followed Warrensburg's specifications until 1910, when the conditions of admission became vague and
references to examinations were omitted.
1 See page 336,
812 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
of mutual charges always afloat When Kirksville in 1904 refused to enter Into a joint
agreement, and proceeded to let down the bars to any one, the other schools were
practically compelled to follow at a greater or less distance, with the result that
each school has since practised a vague compromise governed largely by its " inter-
pretations " of the candidate, and of his papers when he had any.
It is quite indispensable that in a matter of this sort unity should prevail on the
basis of clearly reasoned principles, and that such agreement should include not only
the principles but their actual administration. In event of the consolidated adminis-
tration proposed elsewhere, the permits for admission could be issued at a central
office. Even under present conditions, the simplest possible arrangement would be to
have all credit for admission and for advanced standing for any normal school first
determined at the state department, the agency already charged with inspection and
rating of the institutions from which nine-tenths of the students come. This should
be done regardless of the school at which the credentials were to be presented; the
student would then make his choice.
WHAT SHOULD BE THE METHOD OF ADMISSION?
As for the terms themselves on which students should be admitted, it is sufficiently
obvious that the "proving up" method is a delusion. Two main interests are involved:
first, the standards of the normal schools, and second, the welfare of the educational
system from which their students are drawn. As already pointed out, the admission
of students who are untested or unreliably vouched for introduces two seriously dis-
turbing influences: the presence of such students tends, in proportion to their num-
ber, to change the standard of instruction and achievement wholly for the worse ; and
secondly, each is likely to become a "special case" unwarrantably engaging a teach-
er's sympathy for himself instead of promoting devotion to the soundness of that
remoter public service for which he is being prepared. The poverty and vocational
need of many such students brings an overwhelming pressure to bear on "the teacher,
as is substantially shown in the review of student ratings.1 Any rational system of ad-
mission that wiH prevent this relaxation of classroom standards, and tend to obviate
what amounts to a perversion of the normal school teacher's singleness of motive,
should be welcome.
The other consideration suggested is the part played by the normal school as an
institution in the educational structure of the state. It may be granted for the moment
that each normal school could "prove up" each applicant successfully and without
damage to itself, and that it has done so, receiving its students from all kinds of schools
upon virtually the same footing. Even thus it is important to consider what differ-
ence would now appear in the high schools of Missouri if these five normal schools
had from the -outset announced and enforced their new joint requirement2 as stated
in the Springfield catalogue of 1917: "All persons who expect credits for work done
1 See page 321. 3 Entered into since this study was begun.
ADMISSION AND CLASSIFICATION OF STUDENTS SIS
in unclassified high schools or unaccredited academies or colleges will be required to
take examination.1'' " No one can afford to attend an unapproved school."1 The influ-
ence of the university in improving and maintaining the standards of the larger high
schools thru just this means has been incalculable; the normal schools, working in
constant touch as they have with the smaller schools, could certainly have wielded
the same or even greater influence in guiding their development. When this is the
case, surely no school or group of schools has the right to stand out from concerted
action for the sake of independent ambitions. As the Missouri schools have come to
see, a fair and thorough examination is the only just form of entrance requirement
for persons whose educational history is not understood and vouched for by other
competent agencies. Until well-standardized, objective tests can take its place, any
other method is as demoralizing as that of a bank which should extend unlimited
credit to a new customer without enquiring into his resources.
Second in importance only to the examination requirement for admission from un-
approved schools is the need of requiring students who offer approved credit to bring,
in due form, reliable evidence of their past work. This again, aside from safeguarding
the normal school, involves the twofold purpose of breeding in the student a respect
for educational requirements at least equal to that for ordinary business obligations,
and of keeping the contributing elementary and secondary schools conscious of their
duty on the same account. During the Missouri visits it was found that such normal
schools as persistently required proper evidences of previous training had apparently
little difficulty in securing them, while those that failed to require them were emphatic
in the assertion that the schools had no records, that it would be too much trouble
for the teachers and principals to provide them, that to ask them was unjust to the
student, and similar untenable excuses. As in the matter of examination for unap-
proved work, a relentless demand for a clear, signed, and dated statement of the
student's previous work, on a blank issued preferably by the state department, and
deposited in original form with the school, would serve by just so much to stimulate
the small high school to clear thinking and a sense of its responsibility to its pupils.
b. CLASSIFICATION OF STUDENTS
The prevailing principle of classification of students in the normal schools has been
described above: the student states orally his qualifications and is classified accord-
ingly. In certain subjects, such as language and mathematics, a respect for sequence
must of necessity be preserved, but only such as is unavoidable in that subject. It
should not be supposed that there is no modal form of curriculum; the majority of
students can hardly fail to follow a certain broad groove. But the real test of such a
system is to be found in the number and character of the exceptions permitted. These
leave an observer with the distinct impression that each course is regarded much as
a pot of dye in which any applicant for credit may be dipped without regard to his
1 Catalogue, Springfield, page 13.
314 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
age, maturity, scholastic attainment., or teaching experience, or to the relation of these
various factors with the corresponding characteristics of other members of the class.
The asset of similar mental equipment in a class unit setting out upon a cooperative
intellectual undertaking seems wholly unprovided for if not undiscovered ; where it
exists, it exists by accident.1
PROCEDURE AT KIRKSVILLE
The system operates with the greatest latitude at Kirksville, where it started.
"Those who remain . . . know what they have to take; those . . . from outside know
what they need. So classification is completed in less than a day. Indeed classification
almost governs itself.""12 "Almost "seems superfluous in describing the practice of 1915*
On the opening day all teachers range themselves about the large gymnasium and
the student moves from one stand to another cafeteria-wise, making up his program
as best he can from the catalogued offerings. No teacher is responsible, and each
naturally desires a full department; hence, as one high in authority expressed it, "a
student may take whatever he can get a teacher to sign up to, and that is almost
anything.'"' The bewildered newcomer chooses his faculty adviser after the registra-
tion, lest there be undue influence brought to bear on his elections. Even then these
advisers are denied access to the credentials and records of the advisee, if there be any,
so that their advice is never of other than a general nature.3 Lacking official direc-
tion, the student consults some friend who knows the school. It was said that the *
members of the Y. M. C. A. and Y. W. C. A. (!) were especially helpful in counseling
students as to what courses to take, but students declared that usually "one must
expect to lose the first quarter's work " because of not knowing how to choose. The
head of the institution may be called upon to settle disputed points, but endeavors,
as he explained, not to interfere unless obliged to. The whole procedure impresses
one as a plan primarily devised to ensure to each teacher nominally equal terms of
competition for students9 with the president as umpire in the contest.
COMPOSITION OF CLASSES THUS FORMED
The composition of the classes put together in the above fashion agrees with what
one would expect under the circumstances. A class in the "Teaching of Advanced
English" was typical, — excellently led, but found to consist of students few of whom
had yet had any collegiate English, and including several who had not yet completed
1 Theoretically there is a simple and efficient guide for this system of classification. As explained especially at Kirks-
ville, Cape Girardeau, and Springfield, each student is watched carefully after enrolment, and if he cannot " do the
work " in a given class, he is dropped and required to enroll elsewhere. Aside from the confusion to the class and loss
of time to the student, this plan might work if carefully administered, but the class records of these three schools
seem to show that students neither fail nor are dropped in any such proportion as a system of this kind would inev-
itably require. (For further discussion see page 322, note 2.)
3 Bulletin III, No. 2, 1903, page 14.
3 At other schools, particularly at Cape Girardeau, a system of " sponsors," assigned to a student according as his
work is distributed, is used with apparent effectiveness to keep the student advised on all features of his work
including the making of his program.
ADMISSION AND CLASSIFICATION OF STUDENTS 315
required secondary English, yet all were expecting to teach English in high schools,
and were receiving their sole professional instruction for the purpose at this point.1
Subjects are not confined to students of a certain " year" or grade of advancement,
and it is impossible to speak of such groupings at Kirksville. Thirty-seven classes 2 were
carefully analyzed as to the attainments of their members, and of these six contained
students having to their credit sufficient work to be rated in each of the eight years
of the secondary and college curricula; one class only was confined to students in as
few as two such grades, and the median as well as modal range of distribution covered
five years. Most classes showed a certain modal "year" of membership, which made it
possible to calculate the proportion of members above and below such mode. No class
proved to have fewer than thirty per cent, while over a third had more than sixty per
cent of their membership outside of the normal "year" of advancement. More than
two-thirds of the classes contained both secondary and collegiate students; thir-
teen were attended chiefly by secondary students and the same number contained a
majority of college students. Two had secondary students only and seven had college
students only; two were confined to students of the second, third, and fourth college
years.
Similarly with the elements of age and teaching experience: students less than
twenty years of age, usually with no teaching experience, are classified indifferently
with students twenty-five or thirty years of age, or even older, who have taught for
many years. Among the thirty-seven classes above examined, twelve had more than
ten per cent of their students in each of these extreme age groups ; three had twenty
per cent in each extreme group. In point of teaching experience of their members,
these thirty-seven classes ranged from three, in which ten per cent or fewer had
experience, thru every percentile decade to two classes in which one hundred per cent
had had experience.
The conditions just described at Barks ville are not peculiar to that school, but occur
elsewhere even more strikingly in some respects. Comparisons should not be made,
however, between the schools, as the classes analyzed, tho fairly representative of the
school, are not chosen equally from the same subjects or departments in each school,
nor do they constitute the same proportion of all the classes in each school.
Such a mingling of age, standing, and experience involves necessarily a like jumble
of aims in all but a very few of the courses, and with this the educational validity
of the system breaks down completely. What can an inexperienced, seventeen-year-
old girl, part way thru her secondary work and expecting to teach in a one-room
school, find in common as a fellow student with a college woman twenty-five years of
age who has taught for several years and is finishing her preparation for teaching
1 At other schools, the same condition appeared in classes visited: a class in psychology with all years of high school
represented; a class in geography varying: from poor eighth grade to good third year high school; a class in plane
geometry containing new high school students and several teachers, who had taken the subject and had come
back for review.
2 These were selected with the intention of getting from each department a fair representation of classes that would
test the features here discussed.
316 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
high school English? Yet the ancient and mystic formula that "they are both to be
teachers" is invoked as overshadowing all distinctions, even the most glaring. To any
one not under the spell of this unctuous myth, such combinations indicate nothing
but thoughtless and wasteful administration, or worse — a multiplication for the sake
of collegiate impress! veness of parallel electives, most of which would have to disap-
pear if a rational classification were enforced. If it be argued that all this was due to
the variety of material and situation with which the school was confronted, the reply
is simply that a school that claims to have recognized standards should select and work
its material to these standards., and not adapt its standards to whatever conditions
its over-ambitious program may produce.
In their method of classification the other schools differ considerably from Kirks-
ville. Warrensburg, Cape Girardeau, and Mary ville entrust the matter to experienced
committees of the staff, requiring, except at Warrensburg, the final approval of the
president in each case. At Springfield the president himself undertakes to perform as
much of the actual classification as possible, but is assisted on opening days by selected
members of the staff. These methods, especially the first, seem to have resulted in
a more discriminating classification than at Kirksville, where the students in effect
classify themselves and advice is given only when requested, but the salutary effect
is probably still greater in increasing the sense of security and direction that the stu-
dent must feel in having authoritative guidance.
FIXED CURRICULA THE ONLY SOLUTION
The simplest and, in the judgment of the present critics, the only thoroughly safe
way out of such difficulties as have been described consists in the establishment of
fixed professional curricula designed to embody the best possible training for definite
objectives, and the admission to such curricula of those students only who are fully
qualified to undertake them. Normal school attendance outside of full participation
in such curricula should not be permitted until after graduation, and then only for
advanced courses especially designed and offered for teachers in service. By this ar-
rangement departmental rivalry vanishes and "classification governs itself" in the only
legitimate fashion. The problem of varying attainment and different aims at once dis-
appears; these gone, the difficulties of mixed age and experience grow vastly less, and
ultimately become negligible even without rigid regulation. It is firmly believed that
the normal schools can reach their greatest effectiveness only by this course.
If, on the other hand, the present elective system must be retained, the matter of
classification should at once be erected into a capital problem for the expert study
of the department of education, to which it naturally belongs, and its administration
should be entrusted to skilled officers — not the already overburdened presidents — de-
tailed for the purpose, who will give each case adequate attention from a purely edu-
cational point of view. Classes should certainly be reduced to a relatively homogene-
ous standard of attainment. The reasons for this are obvious to any one who has seen
STUDENT PROGRAMS 317
young students suffer from the aggression of advanced monopolists in the same class,
or who has seen the real quality of an advanced class vitiated by the teacher's attempt
to meet all stages of mental development.1 Such a measure would involve at least the
anchoring of courses to certain years of a student's progress^ and thereby would do
much to clarify the situation. Such an arrangement likewise would offer a fair solution
for the problem of transition from secondary to college work — the line at which the
normal schools have hitherto felt most acutely the shortcomings of their system of
classification.2
5. Student Programs
SPEED THE STUDENT'S CENTBAL CONSIDERATION
The question of how much work a student may "take" conditions the further ques-
tion of how soon a student may graduate, and the latter may not incorrectly be re-
garded as the central consideration, from the student's point of view, in his attendance
upon a Missouri normal school. It is true that in other states the normal school may
be and is quite as much of a vocational institution as in Missouri, but when for a
fixed and orderly professional program covering a definite period, there is substituted
an elective scheme which may be followed a term at a time, in summer or in winter, in
almost any combination of studies, and having a given number of points as the chief
goal, a completely different attitude may arise. Such is the case in Missouri. Instead
of facing complacently the fixed requirements of his course as a whole, the ambitious
student is bound to ask: What is the shortest space of time into which I can crowd
enough courses to get the sixty -hour? ninety-hour, or one hundred- twenty-hour di-
ploma, as the case may be. And this demand for speed is undoubtedly the potent
factor in many irregularities. Granted the loose system above outlined, much can be
explained. Students need certificates and diplomas as capital for earning power, and
the normal school is the only official agency for their issue without examination. Press-
ure is very great to hasten them by the validation of old and questionable "grades,"
the conversion of experience into credit, the shortening or omission (with credit) of
66 non -essential5' courses, the introduction of private " courses" by sympathetic teach-
ers, as well as, finally, by programs swollen out of all proportion to the ability of the
student. The hope and purpose of the institutions to increase their numbers for the
sake of the weight a large school has with the legislature works toward the same
1 In view of ttie fact that general mixture of class membership has been customary in the normal schools for many
years, it is surprising to find that of the one hundred and four instructors who expressed themselves in writing' on
these points, as many as seventy-two felt that the situation was damaging to the schools and should be corrected ; the
rest thought that little or no harm resulted, tho some of these had classes in which the difficulty did not exist. The
following are some" of the comments: "Discourages the weak; bores the strong." "Strong students set impossible
pace." "Hard to adapt reference work and general discussion." "Slow require much specific attention," "Imma-
ture overwork and are shy." "Time wasted, interest lags, standards lowered," "Hard to adjust methods to all."
"Viewpoint too varied for uniform work."
3 A simple rule announced at Cape Girardeau since 1910 requires that all secondary work must be done or scheduled
before collegiate work may be taken. So far as amount of work is concerned, this would appear satisfactory as applied
to such students as had no access to high schools. This rule is of little aid to any particular course, however, unless
the course be limited to students of a certain grade or at least to those having certain prerequisites.
318 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
end; to attract and hold students, speed is made easy by the allowance of credit for
every form of student activity — society work, debating, baseball; by the removal
of entrance requirements, by abandoning or devitalizing class examinations, by the
low pass mark, by the frequent repetition of courses, and by the omission of pre-
requisites.
MUCH PRESSURE FOR EXCESSIVE PROGRAMS
Of these various methods of acceleration the excessive program has been the most
obvious to the student.1 Without some formal system of defence, the petitions of the
student are irresistible : he pleads that any number of mere review courses ought to be
allowed; one extra subject will bring the diploma by August, when funds are gone,
and ensure, thereafter, a school appointment; why make an experienced teacher of
thirty follow the program of the student of eighteen? and so forth. Furthermore it
is true, certainly, that a few students in every group have unusual mental grasp, can
satisfy thorough examinations by private work, and can maintain a heavy program
at a high standard. For such minds the best possible facilities should be arranged,
but the observer has misgivings when such students are said to number a third or
more of the total enrolment.
PRESENT PRACTICE : COLLEGIATE PROGRAMS
Three of the schools, Kirksville, Warrensburg, and Mary ville, after much laxness
earlier, have dealt with this situation successfully, and in 1914 were enforcing limi-
tations of student programs in a systematic and adequate manner.2 Noteworthy, too,
Is the extent to which Warrensburg has reduced partial programs, and has brought
the great bulk of her attendance to a common load of work. Springfield has not
been so successful. More than one-fifth of the year's programs are above normal, while
nearly one-third are below.
The situation at Cape Girardeau diflers materially from that at the other schools.
Previous to 1907, the twenty-hour, or four-unit, standard of the other schools was in
force. In that year the requirement for the junior and senior college years was reduced
to fifteen hours per week, doubtless in order to approximate more closely regular college
programs.3 In 1908 the program of the first two years was reduced, and a minimum of
one hundred eighty term hours, equaling one hundred twenty semester hours, was
announced for the degree of A.B.4 This was clearly a credit basis of fifteen hours per
week, and has been maintained ever since; the maximum was set at fifteen hours for
junior and senior college classes, and eighteen for freshman and sophomore classes,
except as increased by faculty permission.5
1 One normal school graduate seriously recommended attending the school by single terms on the ground that one
could load up for a term with an amount of work intolerable for the year, and thus save time in the end.
2 See pages 434, 435.
8 Catalogue, Cape Girardeau, 1907, page 27.
4 Ibid, 1908, page 86. 5 Ibid ., 1910, page 83.
STUDENT PROGRAMS 319
On this basis, program-making among the college students at Cape Girardeau
came to the following results in 1913-14: l In the case of students attending the reg-
ular session,2 one-fifth of the programs were below normal,3 and three-fifths were in
excess of normal; nine per cent are scheduled for twenty hours or more per week. In
spite of the formal distinction made between upper and lower classmen as to num-
ber of hours permitted, the proportions given above apply about equally to all classes.
Twenty-five, or three per cent of the total number of programs, were rated as senior,
and of these forty per cent were for eighteen hours or more; of the one hundred sev-
enty-nine junior programs, fifty-four per cent were similarly extended.
Whether or not it requires any particular ability to be allowed to take a heavy
program at Cape Girardeau does not appear. It is clear that forty per cent of the col-
legiate attendance may, by taking eighteen hours or more of class work, acquire the
necessary one hundred eighty term hours of credit in three and one-third years or
less. Furthermore, by the preferential system of rating, in use at Cape Giraideau since
1918, a student who does somewhat better than the average and is marked "B" is
allowed fifteen per cent additional credit, and the " A * student is allowed thirty per
cent. A person, therefore, who takes eighteen hours of work and secures an " A" rating
receives a bonus of upwards of forty term hours*' credit and may finish his one hundred
eighty hours in two years and two terms, or, if he receives a "B" rating, in three years
with six hours to spare. As "A" and "B" ratings constituted about a third of the
school's total ratings for 1913-14, it is evident that this is no merely theoretical ad-
vantage. To be sure, relatively few remain at Cape Girardeau for advanced work,4
but credits earned on the above basis are carried wherever the student goes; except
that, oddly enough, the school does not certify the bonus for excellence elsewhere than
on its own diploma — a form of student solicitation that can hardly be commended.
Cape Girardeau shows marked differences from the other schools in the sharp drop
taken in the programs of students attending only in the summer: over three-fifths
are below normal, while scarcely one-tenth rise even slightly above. The other schools,
particularly Kirksville, make a remarkably even showing in this respect, maintaining
about the same load in both sections of their attendance.
SECONDARY PROGRAMS
The secondary programs of all five schools are comparable. Springfield is unique
in permitting a great number — nearly one-third — of partial secondary programs,
while Warrensburg maintains the same distinction shown in her collegiate programs,
1 See page 484.
2 The programs followed by students coming only in the summer were abnormally small, the median being- actu-
ally below the normal number of hours. This disguises somewhat the situation during the rest of the year if only
the total of both sessions be considered.
3 " Normal " is here reckoned as fifteen or sixteen hours. At the other schools one and one-quarter hours* credit is
allowed for a five-hour unprepared course in addition to the regular twenty-hour schedule.
* The proportion of collegiate programs taken by seniors was three per cent, and several of these were made early in
the year before the student attained senior rating.
OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
and brings ninety per cent of her students to a standard load of work ; the remaining
ten per cent is certainly ample to provide for programs that are in fact exceptional
without being merely arbitrary. Cape Girardeau again far outdoes all the others in
the amount of credit which she allows. In the regular session sixty-five per cent of
the programs are made out for five secondary units per year or more, altho the stand-
ard definition of these units is " one-fourth of a year's work." In two years and one
summer session many of these secondary students secure credit that would admit them
to a college or university conditioned in but one unit of work ; not to speak of the
fifteen and thirty per cent bonus allowed In addition for excellence, which for "B"
students would nearly cut off the above mentioned summer session, and for " A"
students would fully admit without condition on two years' work with half a unit
to spare. Such lavish bestowal of credit 011 the part of a reputable institution is an
injustice to students, to other institutions, and to the public.
TIME REQUIRED FOR PREPARATION
At three schools, Kirks ville, Warrensburg, and Maryville, the students were asked
to report on the average amount of time spent in preparation of each lesson. The
differences shown in the results were marked. The "Warrensburg student of every grade
spends from half an hour to one hour on his work, while at the other schools the median
student spends half an hour more. There may be some connection between this fact
and the larger proportion of programs at Kirksville and Maryville that have less than
the standard number of hours. The more uniform achievement at Warrensburg may
be due to a shortened period of preparation. At all schools the men give less time to
study than the women ; and in general the secondary student spends slightly less time
than the collegiate student.
Is THE STANDARD OF CREDIT IN THE NORMAL SCHOOLS TOO Low?
With the exceptions already noted, the Missouri normal schools appear to have
regulated the size of student programs with success. From the point of view of the
educational commonwealth at large, it would seem fair to ask whether their standard
is not still too low. When four credit units is the recognized norm for a year's per-
formance in secondary work the country over, why should four and one-half be al-
lowed here ? Certainly if these schools are to do their share in maintaining for the
country as a whole a definite interchangeable standard, they should conform more
nearly to the general practice in this respect.
STUDENT RATING : EXAMINATIONS 821
6. Student Rating1: Exammatloiis
SELECTIVE FUNCTION OF RATINGS
The measurement of the results of student effort and the correct estimate of the
quality of the product naturally play an important,, if not decisive, part in determin-
ing the status of a given educational institution. Some means of education, such as
libraries, are relatively passive; their effect must be observed indirectly. Other agen-
cies, like most colleges and high schools, profess to organize their efforts to ensure a
certain standard of assimilation of what they offer, and they assume the responsibil-
ity for ascertaining whether or not that standard has been reached. In other words,
they are consciously selective institutions. Indeed, the standards that they set up are
determined in no small degree by the extent to which they propose to serve a selec-
tive function. If all who present themselves at a given institution are uniformly ac-
cepted and passed thru its processes, it is justly inferred that no standards of selec-
tion exist ; if selection is desirable at all, it must of necessity occur later, when these
individuals are in active service. If, on the other hand, a third of the candidates are
disqualified, either at entrance or in the course of their training, from receiving final
approval, it is a reasonable inference that the institution is at least taking an active
part in defining its product and in rejecting unsatisfactory results, whatever may be
said of the appropriateness of its requirements.
THE PRACTICE IN MISSOURI
For a period of about ten years, from 1875 to 1885, the Missouri normal schools
made use of an examining board consisting of the presidents of the three institutions
existing at that time and the state superintendent of public schools. Candidates for
graduation were first recommended by the teachers, and were then examined before
this board, which met successively from school to school. Before and after this period,
the responsibility for determining the requisite qualifications of a graduate rested
wholly with his instructors. The same plan is followed now; each term-course, that
is, each two-and-one-half-hour unit of each curriculum, is complete in itself, and con-
tributes its rating to the final result, unmodified by any general test. What these
ratings were for the year 1913-14* is shown in a table elsewhere which is complete
for the entire year for all of the schools.1
A clear idea of the situation may be had simply by inspecting the proportion of
failures when arranged in order of departments and divided between secondary and
collegiate subjects.
Secondary classes, made up of fresh arrivals, belated students, applicants for "ap-
proved grades," and other unsorted material, show but five per cent of rejections, with
a maximum of eight per cent in English ; while collegiate classes in which the pro-
fessional work of the school is concentrated, turn back fewer than two in a hundred
1 See page 435.
OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
PERCENTAGES OP FAILURE IN SECONDARY AND COLLEGIATE COURSES
Secondary Collegiate
English 8.3 English 8.7
History 6.5 Mathematics 2.5
Foreign Languages 6.3 History 2.3
Mathematics 5.9 Professional Subjects 1.8
Music 5.4* Household Arts 1.8
Professional Subjects 3.9 Science 1.4
Science 3.6 Manual Arts 1.4
Manual Arts 1.6 Music 1.0
Household Arts 1.1 Physical Training .7
Art and Expression 1.0 Foreign Languages .5
Commercial Subjects .9 Library Economy .3
Art and Expression l 4.4
Commercial Subjects1 3.4
All Subjects 5.4 All Subjects 1.9
registrations, in spite of the number of fresh and untested minds that come in from
all sorts of high schools. The actual proportions range from one and three-tenths per
cent at Kirksville to two and six-tenths per cent at Springfield. It was generally
urged in explanation of the low proportion of failures, that these had been forestalled
by shifting during the term those who were unable to keep up; they would therefore
appear among "dropped" students. Further enquiry showed, however, that most of
these persons probably left their classes for other reasons than failure.2 The total
index of selection, even with every allowance made, is undeniably small. It is not
likely that the Missouri normal schools make any greater effort to correct their in-
itial classification than do good institutions elsewhere, yet these other institutions
show a normal elimination that is much higher. Most of the Missouri normal schools
take pride in the fact that their ratings follow the normal probability curve as em-
phasized latterly at the University of Missouri, but as they appear to consider this
1 The high proportion of collegiate failures shown in the departments of Art and Expression and in Commercial Sub-
jects is due to one school in each case and is evidently exceptional.
2 " Dropped" students may have dropped a course in order to lighten their work, or to enroll in a course better suited
to their degree of advancement, or they may have left school altogether for outside reasons. It is of some importance
to know which of these events occurred. Omitting Maryville, the schools lost in 1913-14, 531 students, who left in mid
term before their work was completed. The reasons for these withdrawals could not be ascertained, but it isnotlikely
that they were other than would be true of a similar group in any year, and in 1917 the schools explained withdrawals
of this nature as follows: At Kirksville, in the fall term of 1917, students withdrew to take teaching positions, or be-
cause of sickness, or because they were needed on farms or in stores, but none withdrew because of failure. At War-
rensburg, "leaving school before the end of the term, as a general thing, is caused by sickness or the need of their
services at home. There is hardly ever a case on account of low grades." At Cape Girardeau, the largest number left
to teach, others on account of sickness, business, marriage, or finances, and about one-eighth because of failure. At
Springfield, exact numbers were not available, but eight per cent was given as the regular annual mid-term loss, and
failure was assigned as the last of four reasons for it. On the whole, ten per cent would seem a fair allowance for
the failures among these complete withdrawals. Assuming that each withdrawal from school would affect an aver-
age of four subjects, a total of 2124 canceled registrations would result, ten per cent of which might be for fail-
ure. There being but 2178 canceled registrations all told from these schools, the balance of 54 cancellations must
account for students who dropped their courses but did not withdraw from school. Distributed among four schools
and throughout four terms, this number of changes in classification is hardly important, even if we assume, as is
scarcely credible, that all changes not due to withdrawal were due to failure. On the whole, one must conclude
that dropping students from class for the purposes of better classification is not a marked feature of Missouri prac-
tice. (The contribution of Warrensburg to the above calculation is for 1915-16.)
STUDENT RATING : EXAMINATIONS
distribution as applying to their "passing" grades exclusively, its use loses signifi-
cance.
The order of departments in respect to failure is noteworthy. Altho these are
schools for the preparation of teachers professionally, the main selection in collegiate
as well as secondary courses is exercised by the academic departments of English,
mathematics, and history; professional subjects and household arts are tied for fourth
place.
COMPARISON WITH HARRIS TEACHERS COLLEGE
The most significant comparison that could be made in this matter -is with the
Harris Teachers College at St. Louis.1 The present regulations there admit without
examination only students having average high school records equal to the minimum
general average of the upper two-thirds of the graduates from St. Louis high schools.
Previous to 191S, however, the college admitted any graduate from an accredited four-
year high school, and from September,2 1910, to 1913 had had three hundred thirteen
graduates on this basis. Eighty-five per cent of them came from St. Louis public high
schools — admittedly a superior system of schools — and were therefore probably bet-
ter prepared for academic work than the group attending the state normal schools.
The table below shows the failures of these graduates in the course of their two-year
curriculum. About sixty others dropped out before completing the course, "many of
them on account of inability to measure up to the standards set by the college." The
failures of these latter students would of course largely increase the percentages were
they included, as similar failures are included in the tables from the state schools.3
Altho in one case we are considering the failures of a given group throughout their
course, while in the other case we have all of the school's ratings for a given year,
the results seem sufficiently comparable for our present purpose. As already pointed
out, the terms of comparison favor the state schools, yet they fall far behind in their
proportion of selection.
It would at first appear that the same relative order of departments occurred here
as in the state schools, and that the professional subjects were low in the list. It should
be remembered, however, that at Harris Teachers College the courses in English,
arithmetic, history, and so forth, are all strictly teaching courses that bear directly
upon the students' future work, whereas at the state schools they are of an almost
1 Lest Harris Teachers College be regarded as exceptional, a state-supported school outside of Missouri may be
cited. The state normal school at Upper Montclair, New Jersey, exhibits a proportion of failures during- the second
half-year, 191T-18, of 5.5 per cent. The critical subjects are : English grammar, 14 per cent ; arithmetic, 11.4 per cent
(first term alone, 28.8 per cent): History of Education, 10.6 per cent.
At the University of Missouri during the same year for which the state normal schools were studied, the failures
in "under courses" — those most comparable with the collegiate work of the normal schools — numbered 5,6 per
cent in the first semester, and 6.7 per cent in the second semester. The corresponding' freshman failures in the College
of Arts were 10.8 per cent and 8.2 per cent
2 The date of the last previous revision of the curriculum.
8 The "dropped'* students in state tables refer only to those leaving: before the end of the quarter — an insignificant
number compared to those who leave at the end of the term without completing the curriculum.
824 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
PERCENTAGES OF FAILURE 1 AMONG 313 GRADUATES OF HAB.HIS TEACHERS COLLEGE, 1910-13
English 22.4
Arithmetic 16.9
Science 8.9
History 7.3
Penmanship 6.7
Geography 6". 4
Music 6.4
Drawing 5.1
Psychology 3.2
Primary 2.2
Reading 1.6
Hygiene .9
Observation, Upper Grades .3
History of Education .3
Child Psychology .3
Physical Training .3
All Subjects 2 6.5
purely academic nature. In the state tables, "teaching courses" in these subjects are
included among the " professional courses " which average together but one and eight-
tenths per cent of failure.
It is almost impossible to realize the situation in the state schools without scan-
ning the actual class lists. Thus at Kirksville, where the proportion of failures in
professional subjects is lowest (one per cent), out of two hundred ninety registrations
in the fall term there was only one failure (practice teaching). In the winter there
were three hundred thirty-five registrations and ten failures, eight of them in classes
taught by academic instructors and involving subject-matter such as teaching of
history and teaching of arithmetic. In the spring there were three hundred forty-six
registrations and six failures, three in practice teaching and two in the teaching of
history. In the summer nine hundred twenty-four enrolments were recorded in the
professional department, and one solitary individual failed to pass; this one was in
a class in the teaching of arithmetic taught by an academic instructor. Elementary
psychology enrolled one hundred forty-one students, including many fresh from high
school and other new students from the country round seeking "approved grades'5
for their certificates, yet not one of this heterogeneous group failed to pass the course.
The showing elsewhere is not much better. Is it surprising that teachers of academic
subjects look askance on the department of "pedagogy"? What hope is there for
a true perspective in teacher-preparing institutions, or indeed for popular respect for
the study of education at all, when it figures thus in its own stronghold? Teachers
of education at large are charged with undermining academic standards, and as long
as instances such as these remain, they will have difficulty in disproving the charge.
1 Failure at this school involves repeating the subject.
2 Of the above subjects drawing, music, English, penmanship, and physical training occur in three terms ; primary
and science in two terms ; and the remainder in one term each.
STUDENT RATING : EXAMINATIONS 5£5
SEASONAL CHANGES IN STUDENT FAILURE
The seasonal effect upon passing grades at the normal schools is interesting and
very marked.1 Warrensburg maintains the most consistent record throughout the
year; but all except Cape Girardeau reach a minimum of failures in the summer ses-
sion— the session of largest, most varied, and least familiar enrolment. In its total
showing, the record of failures for the remainder of the year is halved in the summer.
Among collegiate students the proportion ranges from 1.9 per cent at Warrensburg
to .6 per cent at Kirksville.
RELATION OF EXAMINATIONS TO ELIMINATION
One is tempted to seek at least a partial explanation for the above conditions in
the methods whereby student work is tested at the several institutions, but to carry
out a completely satisfactory correlation, much more exact information would be ne-
cessary than is at present available. In such departments of instruction as are likely to
control their work in the usual way, that is, by periodic "tests" and a final examina-
tion,2 some two hundred fifty courses were described in detail by the teachers in the
various schools. At Springfield, where the largest total elimination takes place, about
two-thirds of the courses were reported to use tests and a final examination, having
together an average weight of about one-third in the final estimate; over one- fourth
used "tests" alone, and the remainder (five per cent) used neither. At Cape Girar-
deau four-fifths of the reported courses gave important weight to a final examination,
while but one course dispensed with tests of any sort. Warrensburg reports half and
Mary ville all but one as using final examinations. Five per cent at Warrensburg and
none at Maryville dispense with tests altogether. At Kirksville a different theory has
prevailed. Examinations of all kinds have been officially taboo in favor of the practice
whereby the class is expected to "break new ground on the last day." As a result, over
two-fifths of the classes reported from Kirksville take no form of examination. In
one-third of them, however, the teachers confess to basing part of their estimate of
attainment upon "tests," while in one-fourth of the cases the teacher avows the use
of a final examination as well. Now it is noteworthy that in the departments of Eng-
lish and of history, where the elimination is highest (eight and seven per cent), and
which offset thereby an almost complete absence of failure elsewhere, nine out of four-
teen classes report the use of final examinations, and three more the use of " tests;"
only two follow the tradition of the school and give neither test nor examination. In
science, on the other hand, with its two per cent of failures, seven out of eight classes
go untested and none are examined. The science department at Cape Girardeau, with
twice as many failures, uses tests and examinations in each of the sixteen classes
reported. In professional subjects more than a third of the classes reported at Kirks-
ville undergo neither tests nor final examinations; nearly half use tests alone, and the
1 See page 435.
2 The departments here considered were English, mathematics, history, foreign languages, science, and education.
326 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
elimination is less than one per cent. Elsewhere in these subjects every class reported
is either "tested" or examined, over two-thirds receiving final examinations; and the
elimination is two or three per cent. In spite of the difference in the use of examina-
tions, however, the variation in elimination is so slight, and the absolute amount is
so small in nearly every case, that the condition seems referable chiefly to some more
fundamental cause.
WHY THE NOBMAL SCHOOLS ARE NON-SELECTIVE
It is probable that a variety of reasons contribute to make the Missouri state normal
schools the non-selective institutions they are. In the first place they are not required
to be otherwise. The great demand for teachers resulting from general propaganda,
from state aids, and from local salary regulations favoring teachers with special prepa-
ration, enables the normal school to place virtually its entire product without difficulty
and regardless of quality. The exceedingly varied and elastic scale of requirements in
the different communities favors this, as does the financial condition of the students
themselves, most of whom are glad to take what they can get. This is a different condi-
tion from that confronting the Harris Teachers College. Its field of demand is strictly
limited and of uniform quality. When it raised its entrance requirements in 191S,
it was expressly seeking a means to forestall an over-production of teachers, and it
was obliged either to stiffen its admission requirements or to lengthen the curriculum
to three years.
This lack of a compelling environment is nevertheless only the opportunity for the
existing condition and not by any means its cause. The normal schools, as at present
conducted, do not desire to be selective institutions. Their tradition is to "do some-
thing for the needy student who is straggling for an education,4" and not to select
and prepare fit agents for public service. It has been to their interest to welcome and
retain as long as possible every applicant, strong or weak; large enrolments, the spec-
tacle of doing everything for the community, and "harmony"" at all hazards have been
the real objectives. Such aims do not accord with a selective function or permit of it.
It is obvious from its table of failures alone that the Harris Teachers College is
endeavoring to use its diploma in a discriminating way to guarantee the city of St.
Louis superior teachers, and it is just as obvious that the state schools are almost
completely indifferent to the way in which they mark their product.
This attitude on the part of the state normal schools is needless and injurious,
and ought to be changed. State support and control in professional education ought
to imply a guarantee of good and trustworthy standards consistently enforced. The
state's brand on a teacher should mark a properly selected and thoroughly prepared
and tested instructor, fit to teach in the finest schools of the state. As it is, the best
developed school systems avoid the state's label and are compelled to ask for state
funds with which to prepare teachers of their own. It is doubtful whether a change
can be brought about in this respect except under a centralized system, where the
STUDENT RATING : EXAMINATIONS 3S7
competition for size ceases to dominate each move, and where a uniformly stable and
effective educational policy can be formulated and enforced.
LACK OF THOROUGH EXAMINATIONS A SOURCE OF WEAKNESS
Further, those who have studied the schools for the purpose of the present report
are convinced that the system of instruction unaccompanied by examinations as fol-
lowed in Missouri, particularly at Kirks ville, is a source of weakness rather than
strength. The purpose of a final examination in a subject is to ensure on the part of
the student not only the opportunity for a comprehensive review and thorough organ-
ization of the material, but the actual accomplishment of those ends. An examina-
tion has farther significance as a moral tonic of no slight value; the persistence and
self-control required in preparation, the prolonged concentration of attention, the
need of meeting adequately an important intellectual challenge — all of these are
situations that recur again and again in life. It is especially proper that the profes-
sional servants of the public should be tested repeatedly in this manner. Education
for its own sake may seek to avoid difficulties, but the public has the right to expect
that professional preparation for its service shall make its teachers certain of their
ground, shall sift out the weak, and shall give tone and masterful quality to strong
minds. So far as could be observed, examinations were omitted, to quote Kirksville's
admission, because they were "embarrassing" and uncomfortable, and for that rea-
son only. Like selection of any sort, they involve distinctions which are disagreeable,
but which, in some form, no respectable institution can shirk. All would prefer, of
course, a series of comprehensive and reliable objective tests. Lacking these, a fair and
thorough examination has advantages for such purposes that far outweigh any other
plan hitherto devised.
Examinations entail certain abuses, such as excessive "cramming," worry, nervous
tension, and so forth, which proper regulations for admission and preparation can
largely prevent. The chief abuse in their present application in American schools is
much more fundamental. Given immediately at the end of a term, semester, or year's
course in a subject, their tendency is (1) to magnify details or systematic arrange-
ments of material to be acquired memoriter for the purpose, without ensuring a just
perspective for lasting use, and (£) once over, to supply the student with an irrevo-
cable license to forget completely the matter thus handled. As a consequence, the
student continually fails to review the field at such distance as to allow its large
and really important features to stand out in clear relief and to take their places in
relation to other studies as a permanent possession. It would be of particular value
if students in a limited professional field, in addition to periodic tests during the
course itself, could be held responsible for a general examination at the end of the
curriculum covering the essential features of all their courses in relation to one an-
other. They would thus have a constant stimulus to careful, discriminating thought
relieved of non-essentials, and would acquire for their efforts an organized possession
OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
of the whole much more likely to be permanent than the scattered, unrelated impres-
sions with which they now leave school. Where this method has been introduced, as
recently in examinations for the universities in England, at Teachers College, New
York, and at Harvard University, it has been uniformly successful.
7. Administration of Credit
The recognition and assignment of credit is a vital matter in school administra-
tive procedure. It defines the educational standards of an institution and assumes to
measure by them the attainment of the student. This process is important in any edu-
cational organization. In a public vocational institution it acquires singular promi-
nence because of the constant pressure to convert studious effort into capital for bread-
winning; in a normal school there is superadded the subtle significance of the inter-
pretation of credit as a factor in the creation of true ideals in young teachers. The
discrimination with which credit is given for quantity and quality of student work is
therefore a critical measure of the extent to which an institution discharges its edu-
cational as well as its administrative responsibility. Moreover, as a balance-wheel for
steadying or, when erratic, for disturbing the movement of a school's internal affairs,
the administration of credit is of exceptional importance.
No exhaustive examination of procedure in granting credit was made in this en-
quiry; the purpose was rather to secure sufficient familiarity with the current practice
to enable a trustworthy judgment to be formed. The conditions in each school were
carefully studied, and their development and tendencies were noted by tracing back
the careers of recent graduates. Conferences with school officers, with teachers, and
with many students served to throw light on the matter. Inasmuch as the situation
differs materially at each institution, it will be necessary to describe them severally.
The extended space given to the first is due to the fact that complete records were
available as was not elsewhere the case, except at Maryville. Furthermore, at Kirks-
ville the situation appeared, even on the first cursory examination, to be at the same
time so remarkable and so typical of a certain order of procedure, that further study
and a full description seemed advisable.
ADMINISTRATION OF CREDIT AT KIRKSVILLE
It should be recalled that shortly after the beginning of the school's expansion about
1900, entrance examinations were abolished, and there was introduced the "proving-
up" policy without reference to the credentials presented.1 At the same time a move-
ment was begun to raise the standard of the institution. Instead of accomplishing this
by fully matured and well-organized changes kept stable for a period and required of
new students, or of all students after a certain date, partial changes in requirement were
announced each year. Of the fifteen years, 1900-14, only three are without substantial
1 See page 310.
ADMINISTRATION OF CREDIT 329
alteration in the requirements for graduation. For a guide thru this maze of shifting
demands the bewildered student, coming up to the normal school usually in alternate
years, or even less often, was of necessity thrown back upon the graduating officer, in
this case the head of the institution, who alone could say how much was still required
to ensure a diploma. Thus each and every curriculum became, as to length, a personal
arrangement between the student and this officer, and the demands were likely to
change from year to year unless a written agreement were entered into. It is signifi-
cant that descriptions, found at the school, of this standard-raising process, class by
class, refer to the average number of hours presented by the graduates ; that is, few,
if any, two curricula were identical in amount; a maximum scale of requirements ap-
peared in the catalogue, but the actual performance of a given student might be any-
where within a considerable range below.
THE THEORY
The theory corresponding to this practice is clearly enunciated : the normal school
proposes to "treat each student on his merits" irrespective of any formal or "mech-
anized" requirements whatever. The statements of policy in the catalogue of 1906 l are
typical of the entire period: " We have found it necessary to admit and classify each
student chiefly upon his individual merits." "We purpose recognizing "not only the
merits of each secondary school, whether approved or unapproved by pseudo-inspec-
tion, but also the merits of each individual student as our teachers get acquainted
with them.53 " This school will not attempt to announce in advance the exact time
in which any student may receive a diploma." A genuine merit system of handling
students has been the ideal of every sincere educational institution, and efforts to
achieve it have resulted in various devices for obviating the partisan or too sympa-
thetic judgment, for securing objective standards, impersonal requirements, and, above
all, for dissociating recognition of student effort and merit from any consideration
of the interests of the institution. Kirksville has sought a solution by precisely the
opposite method: by concentrating the final award of credit in the hands of one indi-
vidual, and he the head of the institution.2 Such a policy appears on its face immeas-
surably more difficult to administer fairly than a system which renders this delicate
matter as automatic as possible, and settles the individual problem in accordance with
a well-considered principle, rather than by the arbitrary action of one person — least
of all the person whose position might give color to the charge that student credit
was liable to manipulation for institutional or personal ends.
1 Pages 17-19.
2 Up to the time of the beginning1 of this study the records at Kirksville were inaccessible to any one save the presi-
dent and dean of the school arid to the "registrar," who was essentially a confidential clerk. All final records of
graduates were made out in the handwriting of the president.
830 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
THE PKACTICE
The success of the Erksville plan must be judged by its results. Snch as are here
given are the outcome of a careful examination of a considerable number of records
verified in most cases by the students themselves. They aim to show neither the aver-
age treatment of rank and file nor the wholly exceptional cases ; they are believed to
represent the deliberate policy of the school as favorable occasion may arise.
A true, complete, and intelligible record is, of course, essential to the successful
administration of credit. The institution at Kirksville has given excellent attention
to such records as it possesses; they are well housed and cared for, and have evidently
been kept up with some pride. Credentials for admission or advanced standing, whether
originals or copies, do not exist.1 The student's permanent record presents an inscru-
table collection of term grades, with nothing to disclose when any given grade was
earned or who was responsible for its award; this may be learned only by going back
thru the entire series of term lists during the period of the student's attendance. Many
grades are not regularly reported in these lists, and are therefore lost for the enquirer ;
possible examination marks, made up conditions, and irregular credits of every sort are
in general quite untraceable to their only legitimate sponsor — the teacher. Thus altho
the educational accounts of each student balance perfectly, the different entries, indis-
tinguishable on the record, are extremely diverse in their real nature. Some of the
details are extraordinary.
CREDIT FOR ADMISSION
In pursuance of the schooFs avowed policy credit is accepted from every source with-
out important discrimination. This and the fact that no credentials whatever are pre-
served make it possible to fill up the gaps that arise with credit references of little
significance. "Rural high school * plays a prominent part: this may apparently mean
anything from a book loaned by the rural school teacher to work of merit done under
good conditions. It is always uninspected and unapproved work so far as any official
body is concerned. Such credit may sometimes be tested at the school; instances of
examination were found. It may be taken again in part at the school ; in this case a
single term of grammar, or arithmetic, or algebra, or history, tho barely passed,
carries with it credit for the whole subject. This credit is inserted frequently in the
form of grade letters, as tho the work of all terms had been regularly taken, thus mak-
ing it impossible to judge the source of the credit except after tracing it back. Or the
credit may simply be granted outright without more ado, usually on the plea that the
student has "proved up" in other subjects. If necessary, both outside credit and resi-
dent work covering the same ground are counted in making up the required amount.
x A single lineat the head of the main record sheet provides space for answers, as follows : "Graduateof, " "Attended
. . . yrs ." The permanent record card consists of a triple columnof subjects distinguished as of "High School Rank"
and of "College Rank.'* After each subject is space for "Ghrades"and *' No. units, "or ** Hours Credit. "An exponent
by the " grade" shows the term sequence, and a marginal space records when the student enrolled in the school and
how long he attended.
ADMINISTRATION OF CREDIT 331
SECONDARY CREDIT
Secondary work at the school is further abbreviated by allowing one unit's credit
for two instead of three terms work, even when the grades are low. Thus a "good"
and "passed" grade together repeatedly give one unit in grammar, history, and physi-
cal geography, even at the age of fifteen, and regularly in algebra two units are allowed
for the work of four terms or one and one-third years. What can be characterized
only as a habit appears almost invariably with credit awarded in English, The phrase
is: "Other High School English, one unit," and it stands for nothing tangible that
could be discovered. It was said sometimes to mean membership in literary societies,
and credit for such work was, in fact, announced in the catalogue of 1907. Accord-
ing to the many teachers and students interrogated, however, the work done under
this head has never been subjected to control or accounting. Where such reference
could not apply, as in the case of those doing their secondary work elsewhere, the
credit was unexplained. Another "Tiabit" appears in the reckoning of secondary cred-
its in mathematics. "We assume," it was stated, "that any one who completes solid
geometry must have four units of credit in mathematics."'' On this comfortable as-
sumption deficits in arithmetic or algebra are generously overlooked. Seven term
grades (two and one-third years), consisting of four grades of "passed '"and three of
"good," actually count thus for four complete units. A convenient and economical
practice with "older students" (from seventeen years on) is to enroll them at once
in college subjects, and on the "passing" of these to infer what they probably would
have done had they taken the related secondary subject; the credit so arrived at is
then recorded. By this method a student taking a curriculum in history is required
to cover the ground but once for all secondary (four units in one case) and college
credit. Similarly a course in zoology may net a student collateral credit in "physi-
ology and sanitation " required in the secondary course. A condition* or for that mat-
ter a failure, in the work of one term may apparently be made good by any passing
grade in a subsequent and more advanced terni^s work. So three terms of arithmetic
may read "failure," "passed," "good," and all be accepted for one unit. More often
the failure is not counted for credit, but does not require repetition before promo-
tion, the express catalogued regulation of the school to the contrary notwithstand-
ing. In this way a third term of English literature may follow a second term failure
after a first term graded "passed." Complete failure may still be made good on the
word of a teacher's superintendent, as when four terms of arithmetic, two of which
are failures and two "conditioned," are validated for one unit on the recommenda-
tion of a superintendent in a town where the student obtained a position.
Part of the situation shown above is clearly due to the nature of the subject-matter
recognized in such courses as arithmetic, grammar, elementary United States history,
and civics. These are not professionally organized studies that could profitably be
required of every student in full; as explained elsewhere,1 they are essentially eighth
1 See pages 309, 310.
832 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
grade work somewhat intensified, and any young student who has done well in that
grade and has taught a term or two can take them as it were by samples, if not by per-
suasion.1 Such work should not be recognized for secondary credits; a good high school
requires of its students new work, and normal school courses should do as much, even
tho the basis of the subject be familiar.
COLLEGIATE CREDIT
The absence of dates with the records of grades earned obscures the fact that much
of the work for which collegiate credit is claimed mus%have been very elementary.
One of the recipients of the degree of A.B. in 1914 entered the school from the eighth
grade as a child of thirteen, and in the following year (1904), when fourteen years
old and still under the required age2 for admission even to the secondary depart-
ment, began to earn " college"'' credit, continuing to do so each term for the remain-
der of her course. Another from the same class entered at the same age, and during
her first year was given "college"" credit for a course in zoology. For eighteen of the
thirty terms of this student's attendance, she earned "college" credit and secondary
credit side by side. Not all records are so striking, but the average overlapping of
secondary and collegiate work in the cases of the fifteen members of this class who
did resident secondary work at all was eight terms, or two and two-thirds years; the
least was one and two-thirds years. A better evidence of what the quality of these
"college"" courses must have been could hardly be forthcoming, whatever the exi-
gencies of transition that may explain them.
All work in German and all work in Latin above the second year is rated as col-
legiate at Kirksville on the ground that similar beginning courses are found in good
colleges, but regardless of the fact that such colleges require secondary substitutes
that cannot be slighted. For students who slur over their secondary work this dignifies
with collegiate labels three years of German and two years of Latin, which are in
their cases essentially secondary studies, and enables the institution to that extent to
magnify its " collegiate " department, while secondary courses correspondingly disap-
pear— a much desired result.3 Considering this view of secondary work and the mix-
ture of it with collegiate courses already referred to, it is not surprising to find early
secondary courses drawn upon for college credit when needed. Thus elementary draw-
ing and Roman history in a student's first year of attendance may be transferred and
figure as "five semester hours," An unneeded credit in secondary arithmetic may
appear as a college grade in the "teaching of arithmetic and algebra." A subject may
be repeated and credit given both for the original work and the repetition.
1 The key to the situation is well revealed in the remark of a graduate on one of the verification blanks : "My age,
some experience, personality, and ability to talk kept me from having to do much of the so-called high school work
at Kirksville."
2 Catalogue, June, 1903, page 25.
3 This result appears likewise in the practice whereby "college" work is allowed to count in making up the second-
ary units ; an institution may be nothing but a "college" in this way and yet have no difficulty in providing for its
secondary students.
ADMINISTRATION OF CREDIT 333
Informal credit without class attendance is frequent,, especially in new departments
such as agriculture, A farm boy receives one unit of elementary "agriculture"1'' as rec-
ognition of his home experience; credit in "farm management,11 "farm supervision,"
and " farm architecture," to the extent of twelve and a half semester hours, for work
on the local school farm; further, "bacteriology," "horticulture," "feeds and feed-
ing," and "principles of breeding," to the amount of twelve and a half hours, for work
done privately with an instructor; and finally, a grade of "good," identified rather sig-
nificantly as "Play in Education," for coaching football and baseball. Five additional
hours of college work were granted in this case for the "teaching of science " and for
"agronomy," without discoverable equivalent.
The most prolific source of college credit is practice teaching. As the dispenser of
credit is also the titular superintendent of the practice school, credit for this subject
may be assigned by him without going thru the books of the director of the practice
department. This credit is apparently of three kinds : first, bonafide practice credit
for work done in the training school and regularly reported; second, credit allowed
for all sorts of teaching "experience" outside, little of which is done under compe-
tent supervision, nor is an accurate estimate or report of it available, "Experience"
has been expresssly allowed some credit both at the university and at the other normal
schools, but the Kirksville practice differs in that its credit for experience is regu-
larly recorded in definite class grades for fictitious subjects indistinguishable from
other local work and that it is excessive in amount. "On account of her good record
as a teacher in the state," one student proved to have received seven and a half hours'
credit described in the record as "principles of teaching/' "psychology," and "rural
school methods and observation;" this in addition to one year's credit for practice
work, two terms of which were reported from the training school. Another student
had done no regular practice teaching, but received ten hours"5 credit "for substi-
tuting at odd times for teachers who were sick." The third type of practice credit
is apparently granted in pay for chores, educational or otherwise; thus labor on the
school farm, in the laboratories, or service as desk attendant in the library is allowed
credit under this head in partial payment, the remainder coming in cash. The so-called
"teaching-scholars" have regularly been allowed teaching credit in addition to their
remuneration even tho their work received no attention that could be termed super-
vision. When teaching credit is no longer considered allowable, credit is given for
some definite course; for example, credit for a college course in "English literature"
is awarded for teaching a secondary class in grammar.
Unusual merit is recognized in a yet more unusual manner. When other methods
are exhausted, all academic requirement is waived and credit is presented outright.
The beneficiary of the two years of practice-teaching credit referred to above shows
a preponderance of excellent grades, tho no better than many others. Yet to com-
plete_her record to the requisite number, six and a quarter hours were added arbitra-
rily, altho carefully distributed among specific subjects. Another student, with a record
334 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
of thirty-five semester hours at Kirks ville and thirty from another school, was granted
the one-hundred-twenty-hour diploma and B.S. degree. Seventeen hours were allowed
in stenography ahd typewriting, possibly for secretarial experience at the school,
seven and a half for travel in Europe, and the remaining thirty are still unexplained
after repeated enquiry; twelve specific courses are set down as usual, but no one of
them appears actually to have been taken anywhere.
The pains to assemble specific data for this type of credit are not always taken.
At least three degrees of a blanket character were granted in or about 1912. "We
never could actually get his grades together but we knew the man" is the j ustification.
Up to 1915 nine teachers at Kirks ville had received the bachelor's degree irregularly.
Eight of these were fully employed by the school at the time, and offered no residence
work ; one held some resident credit but was awarded the degree of A.B. in duplicate
after taking it from a good college, and became in this vicarious fashion the second
four-year graduate the school had acquired. Some of these degrees were given outright
as complimentary; others make great show of evaluating earned credits: one of the
latter includes, as more than a fifth of the total hours, experience in teaching in ele-
mentary schools. Similarly a renewal of certificate, which by the school's rule requires
ten semester hours of additional study, may be had on enrolment and payment of the
registration fee only.
Finally, in case the school becomes desperate for means whereby to graduate a stu-
dent, one last resource avails — a conditional diploma. On the promise to return and
make up a deficiency of from one semester hour to over half a year's work, or else to
surrender the certificate or diploma, fifteen students in one class, twelve in another,
and two in another received the signed documentary evidence of the completion of
their course. The time limit set was usually one year, but this might be extended.
TIME REQUIRED FOR GRADUATION
The time element in graduation under the Kirksville system is an important factor
in attracting students and in building up a "degree class." This process really began
in 1910, when four took the degree.1 Three of these were studied from the records:
one presented six secondary units and two and one-third years 2 of attendance at Kirks-
ville, making four years at most for an eight-year degree; another did all his work
at Kirksville, putting the eight years into four and a half;3 and a third offered five
units and five and one-third years of attendance, making six and a half years in all
instead of eight. Of the six graduated in 1911, the two who were studied presented,
one of them a year in a Missouri "high school" unlisted by the state department, a
year in " private study," and four and two-thirds years of attendance ; the other gradu-
1 Two four-year bachelor's degrees had been granted before, one in 1907 and the other in 1908.
2 The term "year" as used here and below means the customary school year of nine months or three normal school
terms.
8 This record shows 22} semester hours earned in a single summer term, which may partly explain the case.
ADMINISTRATION OF CREDIT 385
ated from a then second class high school and attended at Klrksvllle three years. In
1910 the catalogue announced a "five-year teachers' college course" with graduation
platforms at each annual stage and with the degree of bachelor of arts or science
crowning the fifth year's work. The records of students receiving, on this curriculum,
the diploma of an expressly "Four-year Teachers" College Course preceded by a four-
year High School Course*"1 are interesting. One high school graduate receives it in
three years; while a student who did all his work at Kirks ville completed the re-
quirements of eight years in five. A degree of A.B. which in 1912 was advertised to
require five years above high school, or nine years, was taken by a student presenting
six units obtained in a rural school, after four and one-third years, making a total of
six years at best.
Conditions in 1914 were the same, altho the five-year degree had disappeared from
the catalogue. A student was allowed eight units from a "high school*" too weak to be
listed by the state department,, and was given his elementary certificate, requiring
thirty semester hours, in two years, his professional college work beginning immedi-
ately after his entrance. Another, with two failures, seventeen " passed *" marks, forty-
seven grades of "good," and six grades of "excellent," received the sixty-hour diploma,
and was within seven semester hours of the ninety-hour diploma — a seven-year curric-
ulum— in five and one-third years. Of the A.B. and B.S. students, one starting with
"passed" in grammar and "failed" in arithmetic reached his goal in five and two-
thirds years, a saving of two and one-third years. Another took one year more in
spite of a much better record, and yet another, with practically all "E's," covered the
eight-year curriculum in five years plus two summer sessions of six weeks each at the
university. These cases were by no means exceptional.2
The facts above related leave one divided between admiration for the ingenuity and
good fortune that could devise and operate such a system for so long a time unexposed,
and resentment at the fraud perpetrated on unwitting students who trusted the state
for straightforward treatment. The direct loss to the state is not a small one. To
those who do not care to undergo the humiliation of having their degrees heavily dis-
counted at a good institution — an event of frequent occurrence — graduation at
Kirksville is not only the end of a dwarfed curriculum, but an actual bar to further
study. Given the plausible theory of "individual merits," and setting up one personally
interested and irresponsible person to be the judge, the rest follows as a matter of
course. We have here an excellent illustration of what a state institution, into which
students are practically forced by legislation, may arrive at without provision for con-
stant educational scrutiny and audit. Thanks to a sound-minded corps of teachers and
1 Catalogue* June, 1912, pages 29 and 173.
3 It was instructive to come upon a resum& of the careers of these graduates in 1914, compiled by the school authori-
ties and published in the catalogue for 1915; likewise a similar analysis, for later graduates, in the report of the
state superintendent for the same year. The columns there indicating the time spent in secondary and collegiate
work seem to be replete with errors, unless the method of calculation be understood. This is simply to take the total
amount of college and secondary credit assigned as here described, and divide it by a standard year's program,
thirty hours or four units. The "time" there given bears no relation to time actually spent, altho the impression Is
conveyed that it does.
336 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
a keen student body, a material change was brought about just as this study began.
By their joint action at a favorable moment, the administration of credit for gradu-
ation was transferred to a committee of the teachers, where it has since been confirmed
by action of the regents.
ADMINISTRATION OF CREDIT AT WARREN SBURG
The examination and transcription of records at Warrensburg was halted by the
fire which destroyed the school buildings on March 6, 1915. All the records of the
school together with the two weeks' work done by members of the enquiry staff were
lost. The general impressions gained thru this period, however, have been supple-
mented by study of such sample student careers as could be restored from records
held by the students themselves.
The record system in use at Warrensburg was a clumsy bequest from a much ear-
lier period and merited destruction. The entries were undated and hence impossible
to trace except by reference to teachers1 class lists. Each student's account appeared
to be carefully balanced, and, so far as was discovered, the items meant what they said.
The records at Warrensburg are in charge of an official and independent registrar,
who follows a regular routine, as is the practice in good higher institutions. In accord-
ance with rules agreed upon by the president and the faculty, credentials for admis-
sion, advanced standing, and graduation are administered in behalf of a faculty com-
mittee by the dean of the faculty, who is also the head of the department of education.
The main ground for confidence in the general procedure at Warrensburg was the
impression derived from the examination of the admission credentials of about one-
fourth of the enrolment of 1913-14 taken alphabetically and interrupted at this
point by the disaster already referred to. As is customary at the other schools, War-
rensburg admits and classifies students without having their credentials in hand.1
When they become candidates for certificates and diplomas, however, official creden-
tials are required, and are invariably retained and filed at the school. So far as the
examination went (about five hundred cases), th& credentials bore out the credit allow-
ances in every particular. Credits from unapproved high schools were in general fairly
discounted, and even approved schools were likewise occasionally penalized. The value
of some credentials from colleges and schools in other states was difficult to estimate;
but the effort to do the student substantial justice and at the same time to protect
the school was evident. The worth of the credential once determined, the allowance
was duly stated and entered on the permanent record; it apparently was not open
to reinterpretation. In view of Warrensburg^s experience, it is plain that Missouri
schools of all sorts can be induced to certify their students if the matter is patiently
and persistently followed up.
1 It was possible at Warrensburg to compare the credentials finally submitted from the schools with the student's
own claims on his advance information sheet. In very numerous instances the latter were in excess of the other,
tho occasionally the reverse was true. The desirability of having: these credentials in hand from the outset seems
obvious.
ADMINISTRATION OF CREDIT 337
A dozen Warrensburg graduates of 1915 were found who could restore their rec-
ords by means of their own grade cards. Seven received the sixty -hour diploma. Of
these, five were graduates of first class high schools ; one spent two years in such a
school, and one spent a year in the Warrensburg training school. The years required
to secure this six-year diploma were as follows: 6? 6f, 6, 5§, 6J> 5, and 7f . Excessive
programs were permitted the five-year graduate ; as many as eighteen credit-hours
in one summer term, instead of ten. An extra year of high, school work (first class)
was credited to another as two terms of college work. Teaching experience was ex-
pressly allowed two and one-half hours in each of four cases. Three of the twelve took
the ninety-hour or seven-year diploma. One of these was allowed seven units for two
years in a third class high school (1906), and graduated in just five years more with.
ninety-five semester hours; another received nine and two-thirds units for three years
in a second class high school (1905), and took four and one-third years more to grad-
uate; the third had two years in the normal training school, and spent seven years
longer in attendance. The remaining two students were graduates of a first class high
school ; one attended four and two-thirds years in addition for a special diploma in
household arts (one hundred fourteen and one-half semester hours) ; the other took the
degree of B.S. after five years of work subsequent to the high school. The latter stu-
dent had one hundred sixty- six and one-quarter semester hours to her credit for the
one hundred twenty needed; it should be said, however, that in four terms she was
allowed to take fifteen hours of credit per term instead of the Warrensburg standard
of ten hours, and twenty hours in each, of two terms, all of this forced credit being
allowed as "college"" work.1
All credits appearing as such in the above records were bonajide class credits as
verified by the students. Secondary work, such as algebra and ancient history, is given
credit only for the time actually spent in case the usual time is shortened. Some am-
biguity was found in distinguishing between secondary and college credit; in such
a subject as agriculture, part of the class take it as "secondary" and certain others by
virtue of outside assignments have it reckoned as "college" work. No diplomas have
ever been granted without formal attendance and class work.
The impression left by conditions at Warrensburg was that of a thoroughly sincere
and forceful organization anxious to maintain sound principles, but hampered by a
lack of clearly defined standards.
ADMINISTRATION' OF CREDIT AT CAPE GIRARDEAU
At Cape Girardeau the office arrangements for handling student records were much
the best of any that were met with at the normal schools. The main record sheet was
nearly a model of what a school should aim to preserve for each of its students, and
the other blanks in use indicated that the problem of student administration had been
carefully studied. So far as the usual routine reports of credit were concerned, the
1 This would involve a schedule of thirty and forty periods of recitation weekly.
888 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
system had obviously been kept up with perfect fidelity under the supervision of an effi-
cient registrar. It was surprising, therefore, to find that the importance of an educa-
tional balance-sheet for each student had been -quite overlooked. The settling of ac-
counts for graduation had been entrusted to a committee that acted chiefly thru its
chairman. It was the latter's custom each year to work out the account for each grad-
uate on a special slip, which was destroyed after his graduation. The school has there-
fore no statement showing the exact terms on which its graduates have received its
diplomas or certificates ; many records are several, and some very many, hours in arrears
of the stipulated requirements for the diplomas granted. Admission credentials like-
wise have had no systematic attention. Cases where credit for admission must have
been offered showed no record of the fact, and in many cases even of the most recent
graduates the admission credentials were missing. Under such circumstances any com-
plete auditing of the books was, of course, impossible. As far as they go, the records
are fully and frankly explanatory. Grades not earned by class work are clearly referred
to their proper source: examination, correspondence, extension, or experience.1
Peculiarities of credit handling at Cape Girardeau are as follows: Full credit is
allowed for elementary subjects "proved up" by a term's work at the normal school.
Fifty per cent extra is allowed on all secondary credit in mathematics except arith-
metic. Collegiate credit is granted in foreign languages on the score of native ability
in conversation. Credit is allowed from the local training school to the extent of nine
and two-thirds units for two years of work. This with the speed permitted in the nor-
mal school comes perilously near being a three-year high school curriculum. Advanced
standing with full credit is allowed without examination for work done at short-term,
unapproved high schools even where the subjects are not "proved up" at the normal
school. Credit is granted for experience in teaching to the extent of eight semester
hours. Experience has also been used to justify the enrolment directly in college work
of a student with but nine units of secondary credit, and on his securing good marks>
the granting to him of sufficient units in elementary subjects which he had taught to
make up his deficiency. High school credits in excess of those required for admission
to college courses have been allowed two-thirds of their value in college credit.2 Why
tibis was done for the professional diploma and not for the degree of A.B.? as is stated,
is not clear. The overlapping of secondary and college work amounts on the average to
about three terms or one year, which as a maximum is reasonable and conforms to the
school's rule in the matter. Degrees have been granted to four persons while active
members of the faculty.3 No conditional certificate or diploma has ever been issued.
The chief weakness in the credit policy at Cape Girardeau stands out clearly in the
records themselves and has already been discussed.4 The normal credit allowance for
1 The date and name of the instructor authorizing the irregular credit would be a desirable addition.
2 This practice is now discontinued.
3 One of these did all of his work at the University of Michigan, and another did all of his advanced work at the
Universities of Chicago and Missouri.
* See pages 318-320.
ADMINISTRATION OF CREDIT 339
a year's work is planned at four high school units or thirty semester hours;1 yet this
is exceeded in nearly half the cases.2 The graduating schedule adopted early in 1914
reduced the requirements for the advanced diploma from seventy-six to sixty se-
mester hours, or two full years of college work, in addition to a four-year high school
course. Yet of the fifty- two graduates in 1914 whose records were examined, twenty-
three showed from one to five terms less than six years of schooling. These curtail-
ments were not made by outside study daring vacations or otherwise and followed
by examinations. They were the result in most cases of excessive programs permitted
the student by an indulgent school; five and six studies appear frequently on the sec-
ondary programs, and the credited hours, normally fifteen per week, run from sixteen
to- twenty-four, often with the help of the fifteen and thirty per cent bonus peculiar
to Cape Girardeau. The same thing substantially was true of the eight-year graduates.
Up to 1914 thirty-six had taken degrees. Of the twenty-three records examined,
ten had a clear score of full attendance, tho several, as already explained, were appar-
ently deficient in hours; five or six appeared to have had credit from elsewhere of
which there was no account, and the rest were lacking in attendance and hours for
no reason that could be learned. The following case from the class of 1913 illustrates
the possibilities. The student went nowhere else after leaving the elementary school,
but received credit, partly with and partly without examination, for study at home.
The normal school at Cape Girardeau was attended for three years of nine months
each previous to 1906, and granted the degree of Bachelor of Pedagogy. In 1912 the
student returned for three terms, nine months in all, and earned during this time
more than fifty semester hours" credit, taking the degree of A.B. after but three years,
at most, of collegiate work.
ADMINISTRATION OF CREDIT AT SPRINGFIELD
The school records at Springfield may be termed a "system" only by courtesy. No
connection has been perceived between a lucid, complete, and accurate statement of
a student's work and the "human element in instruction " on which the school has
properly laid great stress. The permanent record is entered on a small card unsuited
to the needs of the school and which, when filled out, is obscure as to dates, charac-
ter, and amount of credit. Admission credit is provided for on the back, but in such
form that each entry requires further explanation to be intelligible, and such expla-
nation is nowhere available. Such as they are, the entries are only partially kept up;
"remarks" do not enlighten. This card, the only card for the purpose, carries no bal-
ance-sheet of a student's work on which certificates or diplomas may be authorized,
and contains no record of such issues. As at Cape Girardeau, the case of each candi-
1 The bachelor's degree purporting to be equivalent to those given elsewhere for a four-year college course requires
the regulation one hundred and twenty semester hours of college work.
2 The fact that more do not exceed the standard does not appear to be the result of action by the school. Cape
Girardeau has a very large number of students who are willing to take only a partial program. (See page 319.) Irregu-
larity either way seems to be a matter of student fancy.
340 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
date for graduation is worked out on a separate slip and attached to the record; after
graduation these are destroyed ! Classification and program cards, the only complete
record the school possesses of a given term's enrolment, are destroyed when the few
drawers containing them are filled. Term grades are transferred to huge sheets, from
which reports are taken; the sheets are then relegated in confusion to a high closet
shelf and given no further attention. Credentials for advanced standing exist to some
extent. One hundred and fifty graduates in 1914 were credited with advanced stand-
ing; for eighty-one of these, credentials were found. In general the records were not
maintained with care or in good order, and they were inadequately housed.
The theory on which credit is assigned at Springfield is not unlike that prevailing
at Kirksville, tho the applications have been far less extravagant and have shown
steady improvement.1 It is conceived to be the school's duty to recognize the worth
of the individual apart from the display of that worth in work which the school guides
and controls, hence the " experienced " teacher as "known " to school authorities has
been allowed special advantages. In the early life of the school, graduates were accu-
mulated in some numbers on this basis, apparently in order that the school might
have friends, and even at present it seems to be considered too " rigid and mechanical "
to exact a precisely supervised equivalent for each credit.
To serve the individual student has been Springfield's special motto from the out-
set, owing to her location in a mountain region where until recently schools were
poorly developed. With this intent admission has been made as easy as possible. Work
done at low grade, short-term high schools has been allowed full credit without ex-
amination, and in several cases considerable credit appears to have been given for
common branches clearly of an elementary nature. "Proving up" is theoretically the
method, but it has frequently amounted to classification in the most advanced sub-
ject in which the student could succeed, and a bold assumption of what might have
gone before. For example, a student who had spent three years at a seven-month, un-
classified high school comes into possession of his six-year diploma after one and two-
thirds years' attendance at the normal school. Another, from a school approved long
afterward for but four units, is graduated in just three years. Entrance examinations
are not favored.
Once in, several things facilitate unusual progress. Springfield has demanded but
forty secondary term credits,2 thus neutralizing her recommendation that students
attend the local high school by placing a penalty of eight term credits on such attend-
ance. An extra credit slips in for high standing, one for debating, and one for mem-
bership in literary societies (said to be carefully supervised). The sympathetic attitude
of teachers and authorities finds it hard to resist appeals for speed at a sacrifice of
every possibility of good work. One graduate in 191 S, who reports having done all of
1 As at Kirksville, too, the administration of credit has been concentrated completely in the hands of the head
of the institution. There is no registrar, and teachers assigned to different classes of graduates have no power to
make decisions.
* The "term credit" is one-third of a secondary unit.
ADMINISTRATION OF CREDIT 841
his work at Springfield, received his six-year diploma in three and two- thirds years with
many seventies and eighties in his record. One term gave Mm credit in ten subjects.
The actual programs of recent years are more carefully watched, but work done under
the old conditions is counted in full for current diplomas. One is impressed here as
in other schools with the indestructibility of " grades ;" as Cape G-irardeau somewhere
advertises: "No credit is ever lost;" they appear, on the contrary, to bear compound
interest thru this use of credits earned under totally unfit conditions in making up
a collegiate curriculum of modern standard. A single case of a conditional certificate
was found.
The confusion in the records makes it impossible in general to audit satisfactorily
any single account. Still, some students, who came as high school graduates and have
attended continuously without "experience1' to offer, seem to present a fairly reliable
score. Full attendance and hours have been required of these. Others with irregular
secondary work and "experience" to capitalize are almost invariably short in account.
The same is true of the four-year degree students, of whom there were nine in 1915
but none in 1914. Three of these were already college graduates, and two had con-
siderable college credit elsewhere ; the records of the rest are obscure, tho one has a
nearly complete record of eight years" attendance at Springfield. Five four-year degrees
are reported as having been taken by persons while members of the faculty, but none
wholly without residence work. The official description of one of these illustrates the
method pursued;
"Professor X was given credit for his high school work at ... , some of it on
his having taught there, and for some hours of study in the high school there.
He did in our regular work here ten semester hours of credit. He was credited
[from another normal school] with 22.50 semester hours of credit. He did what
we call Extension work, credit made by studying with the professors in this school
and taking examinations, 12.50 semester hours of credit. He was given credit
on account of experience and examinations for state certificate to the amount
of 75 semester hours of credit.551
A rather pathetic indication of the sincerity underlying the situation above de-
scribed was the concern shown, not that the records as a whole were meaningless, but
that in successive cases it was impossible to remember what had been the justifica-
tion for the diploma or certificate issued. Little as the actual practices here are to be
defended, records better on their face have concealed worse conditions.
ADMINISTRATION OP CREDIT AT MAKYVIKLE
The school at Mary ville during its first half-dozen years passed thru three admin-
istrations of varying aim and ability, and is but just completing its organization
under a fourth. One is therefore agreeably surprised to find its record system intelli-
1 The state certificate here referred to was secured at a time when persons having only the equivalent of a high
school course secured them without difficulty hy examination.
OPERATION OF THE NOEMAL SCHOOLS
gible and fairly complete, owing perhaps to the continuous service of the present dean
and registrar. A complicated and inadequate record card not unlike that used at
Springfield is kept serviceable by careful administration. Dates and certain symbols
provided make it possible to piece together a student's educational history that ap-
pears accurate. Even here the accounts are left unbalanced and occasionally show
deficiencies, explanations of which should have been recorded at the time of gradu-
ation. The great majority of the graduates at Maryville have already graduated from
high school or academy, and occasionally from college. Of these both attendance and
hours are invariably sufficient. Others, however, who have held over from a previous
regime at the normal school, have been passed thin on a considerably shortened pro-
gram; eight, ten, or twelve units instead of fifteen being accepted for secondary
work, and the attendance being correspondingly reduced.1
"In all but a very small proportion of the possible cases, credentials covering outside
credit are on file, often in the original but usually inform of a copy — an unsatisfac-
tory substitute. These credits from all manner of schools are listed in full on the per-
manent record, to be used if needed, but are nowhere decisively dealt with; they would
appear to be continually open to reinterpretation. Theoretically they are there to be
"proved up."
In administering credit earned at the school there seems to be some confusion as
between secondary and collegiate work. Psychology, when a high school subject? is oc-
casionally converted into college hours; at an earlier date other high school subjects
also found their way over the line. One practice at Maryville should be noted as
evidence of a commendable sincerity. To maintain the standard of the four-unit year,
all unprepared subjects, such as music, drawing, spelling, penmanship, or physical
training, tho required, have been offered without credit; this, too, at a time when all
the other schools were granting credit for everything, and were thereby materially
reducing the time needed to graduate. On the other hand, an order like the following
displays at least a regrettable lack of appreciation of what credit should stand for:
"Credit X. Y, with E [Excellent] in whatever subject she needs in the Department
of ... for a Diploma.1" This was signed by the head of the department. From what the
enquirers learned of the school, any implication from this but that of carelessness
would fail to do justice to the present spirit of the institution.
ESSENTIALS OF CREDIT ADMINISTRATION
After the foregoing resumi of existing practice it is scarcely necessary to set forth
in detail the characteristics of a fitting policy of credit administration. By way of
summary it may be said that any school, and particularly any state-supported insti-
tution, should maintain such a system of educational records that an intelligent out-
1 This is commonly excused on the ground of maturity. In fact, however, the fourteen students who in 1914 were put
thru on a short schedule averaged less than one year older than the twenty-seven students from high schools and
academies who gave full attendance, 21.8 — 22.5. Pour others who studied chiefly at Maryville but spent full time
averaged 24i years of age.
ADMINISTRATION OF CREDIT
sider could read therefrom an accurate history of the work of each individual student
without need for any further explanation whatever. If one form of accounting must
suffer in such an institution, let it be the financial ; the clear and honest discharge of
the educational task is the school's sole reason for existence.1
The definition of acceptable credit is of course the task and responsibility of each
state system, or, if the school be so unfortunate as to be obliged to act independently,
of each separate institution. It is believed that the following procedure, if fairly
enforced, will lead to a sound and self-respecting administration of credit, and will
furnish a satisfactory basis for comparison with other good institutions.
First: Credits for admission or advanced standing in secondary or collegiate
work should be accepted only from such schools and in such subjects as are recom-
mended by the state department of education. Credit from other institutions should
be studied and finally determined in each instance by the state department itself
for subsequent use in any of the schools of the state. All other credits except such as
are earned thru regular class work at the school concerned should be assigned only
after a fair and thorough examination covering each unit of work for which credit is
proposed.
Second: All resident credit should be coordinated strictly with whatever time and
credit unit may have been adopted as a standard. If four units per year or fifteen
hours per week constitute the standard, credit in excess of that should be permitted
only on a basis of proved excellence, and then only in such a limited number of cases
as to keep the real standard valid.
Third: All local credit should involve full-time class work with an instructor; " in-
formal" credit should not be granted. Failure to meet requirements should necessi-
tate either a second examination or a repetition of the course ; otherwise the succeeding
course should not be undertaken. Credit should not be granted to persons while in
the employ of the school except to recipients of scholarships for work for which they
are not paid. Complimentary diplomas and honors or conditional certificates should
not be issued.
Fourth: Acceptable credit should be redefined from time to time as occasion may
require. Such definition should invariably be formulated by a body representing the
several schools, or else by the whole body of faculty rank in the teaching staff of the
institution, and not by the crediting officer alone. The administration of credit should
1 The essential features of such a record are : First: Identification of all credit for entrance and advanced standing:
with full explanations of source, date, and circumstances, amount and limitations of credit allowed, together
with original signed and dated credentials in support of such credit. Second: A clear record of all credit earned in
the school, showing date, character, and amount, catalogue numberof course, memoranda of changes, conditions, or
examinations involved, with filed or recorded authorization of irregularities. Third: Similar descriptions of all fur-
ther credit granted but not earned at the school, such as correspondence and extension credit, allowance for expe-
rience, private study, and so forth, when validated by examination . Fourth : A record of all certificates and diplomas
issued, with balance-sheet stating the catalogue requirements followed and the manner in which these were met.
Certain other facts as to teaching experience and personal history are desirable, but the above are absolutely indis-
pensable. In their study of the records at the various schools the members of the enquiry staff made careful note of
the various local conditions, and later drew up a form of record that seemed appropriate. This draft was prepared as
a suggestion to Warrensburg in replacing the records destroyed there shortly before, and may be of use to any school
of the same general type. Copies may be secured from the Foundation.
844 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
be In charge of an independent officer subject only to the direction of the faculty or
faculty committee.
Underlying the above policy is the general principle, accepted by all good educa-
tional institutions, that institutional credit is assignable not merely for work done,
but only for work done under certain guaranteed and verifiable conditions that meet
general approval and are open to appropriate inspection. As a convenience to indi-
viduals, credit vouched for by other good institutions is accepted and the privilege
of examination is extended, but the right to review the conditions under which work
elsewhere is done, as well as to stipulate that examination may be taken only when
adequate preparation is apparent, must invariably be exercised by the institution, or
by its agent for the purpose, the state department of education.
8. Graduation, Certification^ and Appointment
The normal school has certain duties in the matters of selecting, labeling, and plac-
ing its graduates that may be grouped together as a final feature of administration.
a. GRADUATION
Until quite recently the normal school has considered graduation from its complete
curriculum as a matter of secondary consideration in the sum total of its efforts. The
schools have been concerned chiefly with short courses for transient students, and as
an inducement to these, have held out special recognition to be awarded at the end
of each successive year. According to Joseph Baldwin's scheme at Kirksville, a youth
of fourteen starting with "a good knowledge of Common School Arithmetic, Geog-
raphy, Grammar, and U. S. History5' and progressing with "three studies and two or
three drills" daily in forty-minute recitations, became successively a Bachelor of Ele-
mentary Didactics, a Bachelor of Scientific Didactics, and a Bachelor of Arts and
Philosophic Didactics, all within four years, not to mention a mastership awaiting
him after two years' experience in teaching. Scholastic decoration could hardly be
more lavishly provided. These degrees were actually awarded on an average of about
ten a year in the case of the advanced degree, up to 1884, when there was substituted
a single certificate at the end of the second year, and the degree of Bachelor of Sci-
entific Didactics after the fourth. This degree, changed in 1902 l to Bachelor of Peda-
gogy, was discontinued in 1914. Much the same changes occurred at the other schools
and at approximately the same time. The degree of AJB. was first offered at Kirks-
ville and Warrensburg in 1904, and at Cape Girardeau a year earlier. It was discon-
tinued, except at Cape Girardeau, in 1916, when the conference agreement of the
normal schools and the university recognized the degree of Bachelor of Science in
Education as the common goal of the professional curriculum.
The allurement of degrees seems not to have affected greatly the proportion of grad-
1 Catalogue, Kirksville, 1902, page 23.
GRADUATION, CERTIFICATION, AND APPOINTMENT 345
nates. In 1875,1 out of a total of seven hundred nine students at Kirks ville, only
seventy -two succeeded in finishing the work laid out In one or another of the last three
years. The rest were in the first year or below, or attended for only a part of a year.
So also in 1883-84, grammar9 rhetoric. United States history, and beginning Latin
enrolled enormous classes, while many advanced courses were not given at all. Arith-
metic had one hundred sixty-seven students, while physics had only five, trigonometry
two, and astronomy one. Few graduates could be culled from such an enrolment,
and to all appearances the conditions were similar in the other schools.
From 1887 on, graduation from the normal school carried with it a state license
to teach, previously secured only by special examination or by favor of the state
superintendent on the strength of examinations by the school. This privilege does
not appear to have had any immediate effect upon the number of graduates, which
remained nearly the same until about 1900, when it increased rapidly with the
mounting attendance.
The number of advanced graduates in proportion to the total attendance has stead-
ily tho slowly increased from the outset. Comparing averages of five-year periods, the
change is from about two per cent in 1875-80 to nearly seven per cent in 1909-14
and nearly nine per cent in 1915-16. A six-year school, such as the normal schools
chiefly are, holding its students from the beginning and graduating classes of not less
than two-thirds of their original size, would release about thirteen per cent of its
attendance each year. It is interesting to discover that Warrensburg did still better
in 1916, making a record (14.8) nearly twice as good as that of any other school. This
would seem to indicate a steadier, more regular attendance, more students held thru
the course, and fewer transients. This record is probably due also to the fact that the
two-year course drawing students directly from high school is better developed at
Warrensburg.
It is perhaps worth noting, that in its general policy of graduation the normal school
of to-day is exactly repeating upon the collegiate level, its earlier experience upon the
secondary level. It offers a distinct terminal recognition, not at the close of any par-
ticular curriculum, but at the end of each annual section of the four-year period; on
three of these four occasions, it gives a "diploma." Its first two years are crowded,
while the third and fourth are meagrely attended, as in earlier days.
6. CERTIFICATION OF GRADUATES
A plan for automatic certification by the normal schools was contained in the draft
for the normal school legislation in 1870,2 but was omitted in the act as passed, pos-
sibly out of deference to competing colleges. As stated above, certification by normal
schools was provided for by law in 1887, and has been practised since. According to
this law the graduates of the "four-year course " (the present sixty-hour curriculum)
were to have an unlimited or life certificate; and the graduates of the " two-year
1 Catalogue* Kirksville, 1875, pages 6, 7, 15. z Senate Journal, 1870, pages 551, 552.
846 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
course"1 were licensed for four years. The life of the latter certificate was reduced to
two years in 1889. Renewal of the two-year license at present requires additional
study at a normal school to an amount varying from ten to twenty semester hours
according to the school.
PBESENT FORM OF CERTIFICATION INADEQUATE
The degrees and diplomas available at the normal schools are of little moment in
comparison with the all-important question as to how the skill and learning there ac-
quired for teaching are made available for the service of the people of the state, who
pay the bills. It is a characteristic of teaching certificates in Missouri, from the lowest
to the highest, that so far as the state is concerned, the possessor may teach in any
school, and may teach any subject that he chooses. The virtue needed for this roving
activity is exhausted, now in two years and now in five, but once a sixty -hour curricu-
lum at a normal school is achieved, it lasts forever ! The normal schools have sought
to correct this absurdity by issuing their diplomas with "designated ability," in order
that those who read may know at least part of the truth. But few school boards read
diplomas, and still fewer would heed them without suitable legislation; as a result,
persons with scarcely a vestige of proper qualification or even of schooling teach in
elementary schools, while others, usually with more schooling but equally unqualified
for their work, teach in high schools.2
CERTIFICATION SHOULD BE SPECIFIC
The remedy for this situation is simple and appeals to the reason and experience
of educated communities the world over ; it is to see to it that only those are permitted
to teach who are qualified to do the teaching that they undertake. This was, of course,
the intention when certification of teachers was first devised, and an examination was
required of teachers in order to protect Missouri school children who were learning to
read, write, and cipher. To do as well to-day is to require that teachers of the sixth
grade possess the ability to teach children of that age in a fashion that is now con-
sidered satisfactory. At present each community or district in Missouri decides for it-
self what the value of a certificate is to be, and there is no point whatever in demand-
ing the sort of certificate that the state now requires. Under such circumstances training
schools have little inducement to prepare a student satisfactorily for any position;
and a variety of purposes divides the interest and weakens the performance of each
teacher. Missouri should terminate the confusion and contradiction of this situation,
and secure for herself the real fruits of her fifty-year campaign for better teachers ;
any other course is wasteful and a wholly unnecessary injury to the children and youth
of the state.
1 Little by little thru adjustment to students comingr from high schools this "course " has been advanced one year,
and now requires but one year less work than does the old "four-year course" (the sixty-hour curriculum).
8 The state superintendent has recently tried to better conditions by requiring specific preparation in teachers teach-
ing in high schools that seek state classification.
GRADUATION, CERTIFICATION, AND APPOINTMENT 347
To accomplish this change successfully, three steps are essential: first, the formula-
tion and acceptance of reasonable qualifications for the specific teaching positions in
the public school system ; second, the provision of adequate facilities for giving teachers
these qualifications; and third, the aforesaid requirement that each teacher shall teach
only the subjects wherein he has had the requisite preparation. These are simple prin-
ciples, and can be set forth clearly in law, but their execution is an intricate task with
which no law should attempt to deal. Daring the period of administrative immaturity
of its education department Missouri, like most other states, has sought precautions
by writing into statute law minute specifications of all sorts. In the case of teachers
certificates, the legislators have defined the procedure with elaborate detail, including
the subjects for examination, apparently without realizing that whether an examina-
tion in "physics" means much or nothing depends wholly on the superintendent after
all. It is the same with the rest of these administrative items embodied in law. The
state can reasonably define its wishes in general terms; its best and only guarantee
for satisfactory execution thereof is to ensure trained, competent, and permanent offi-
cers for the purpose. As pointed out elsewhere,1 this assurance in Missouri requires a
change in the constitution.
CERTIFICATES SHOULD ISSUE FROM ONE SOURCE
Assuming for the time being a well-organized state department with a permanent,
trained executive, the best interests of the teachers of the state would require that
all certificates of whatever character be issued from the state office. This admits of no
doubt in so far as county certificates are concerned, and is already near fulfilment in
Missouri.2 Certificates for work done at institutions should be issued from the same
source. Under the present arrangement a life certificate to teach in any school is avail-
able for white teachers from seven different directions — five normal schools, the uni-
versity, or the state department of education. One normal school may have granted
it for success in two years of work in lieu of study at the university; another for a
partial curriculum looking toward some high school subject; another for a thorough
preparation for teaching primary children; while the university confers it on a pro-
spective school superintendent, and the state department offers it for a set of general
examinations or for the completion of certain work in colleges, and yet aH the recip-
ients may be using the document as authority for teaching in the eighth grade. Such
diverse values of the educational currency are bound to result from a divided authority
of issue, and they confuse and weaken the teacher's position throughout the state.
Teachers should be considered as officers of the state, and their credentials should
logically proceed from the state's responsible educational representative in charge of
the public schools.
1 Pages 63 ff.
2 The state superintendent determines the questions for all county examinations, and directs the reading of the
papers in a large proportion of them.
848 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
This does not mean, however, that the normal schools and the university should
exert no influence over the certification of their students. In those respects in which
they are fitted to act, their influence should be paramount. The state superintendent,
in his capacity of general inspector of public education, presumably knows the schools
and the school communities of the state— what they need and what they can pay.
He recommends and controls state school aids and permanent funds. He has a care-
fully planned policy for the gradual improvement of the schools — that is to say,
chiefly, of the teachers. It is he, therefore, who can best know what teaching positions
may be differentiated in certification, how extensive a curriculum the salary in each
type of position will justify, whether the certificates should be temporary or perma-
nent, and how much further preparation should be required for renewal. These are
all administrative details to be determined not, indeed, at the caprice of one man, but
as the slowly matured program of his office, publicly discussed, thoroughly understood,
and changing from year to year as the conditions of the service alter the needs. It is
a fundamental error to put them into statute.
THE INSTITUTIONS' SHARE IN CERTIFICATION
On the other hand, the institutions that prepare teachers are equipped with skilled
instructors for that purpose. It is their business to agree upon and determine the nature
of the work for which certificates to teach shall be granted. Within the limits of aim
and time set by the state superintendent's office, they must decide what is the most
advantageous preparation that in two years, if current salaries will warrant no more,
will equip a sixth grade teacher, or in four years a primary supervisor, or in six years
a school superintendent. School autonomy in this matter is plainly a blunder; the
training schools of a state must work these questions out and move together, and for
this purpose some centralized form of organization is indispensable.1
The initiative and authority of the schools themselves in this process is an asset
that should be retained at any cost. It would be easy to assign the power over such
schools to the state office and thereby to turn the training institutions into factories
and their directors into foremen, as has already been done in some states. The sug-
gested organization of the normal schools as an integral part of the state university
was intended to make this impossible. The dignity and power of the independent
professional scholar should be as much a trait of the state's servant as of any private
worker, and while in preparing teachers he serves a carefully controlled and measured
need, he must be allowed to do it with the vitality and free responsibility of a genuine
educator. This is already true of other professional branches and should be preemi-
nently true of education.
1 See Chapter IV,
GRADUATION, CERTIFICATION, AND APPOINTMENT 349
NEED OF A UNIFIED ADMINISTRATION
It will at once be seen how this joint responsibility for developing and utilizing
the state's teaching power would be facilitated by the unified administration already
proposed. By that plan a single board of education is expected to operate thru its
state superintendent for elementary and secondary schools, and thru its university
chancellor for higher education, including the preparation of all teachers. The state
law should make the board responsible simply for the registration and certification
of the character, preparation, and proved skill of all teachers in the public schools.
Under the board, the state superintendent, because of his knowledge of the field,
should determine the number and kinds of position for which teachers shall be pre-
pared and certified, the length of their training, the life and character of their cre-
dentials. Under the same board the university in turn, thru its group of presidents1
in charge of the professional preparation of teachers, should determine the character
of the curricula in every respect and supervise them, it should conduct all examina-
tions, and should become responsible, in general, for the quality of the teacher's per-
formance. The two departments under one board should be in constant and intimate
contact and interaction, and would be dependent upon each other for ultimate success.
A plan of this character would make possible certain changes much needed in Mis-
souri. Certainly no student fresh from the normal school should be given a life license
to teach anywhere. Such a permit, if ever granted, should be issued only after a pro-
longed and thorough test under the scrutiny of careful supervisors of the candidate's
ability in active service. Practice teaching at the schools, as at present conducted,
gives a valuable but a very inadequate opportunity for this test, as Missouri super-
intendents well know. In addition to much better practice facilities at the normal
schools, some form of the so-called "apprentice" system is needed. This would be very
difficult to arrange under present conditions, but would be a simple matter under a
single board of education controlling the certificate privileges. Such a board could
take a suitable number of schools in the state, selecting them according to the quali-
fications of the superintendent and of one or two especially designated teachers. Here
the normal school graduates could be required to spend a year in carefully supervised
practice before receiving permits for independent work elsewhere. They would be
paid, of course, a reasonable amount, and a bonus would go to the supervisors or to
the school or to both for their service. The details could be worked out gradually; the
point that it is desired to emphasize is that nothing of this kind is easily possible
until a unified administration with complete powers takes hold of the problem; to
attempt to legislate on a matter of this kind could have no good results.
c. APPOINTMENT OF GRADUATES
The final purpose of a normal school is fulfilled only as its fully prepared gradu-
ates are brought into effective relations with the state's youth in some permanent
1 The state superintendent would presumably be an active voting- member of this group, See page 57.
350 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
teaching position. Inasmuch as the success of this adjustment is likely to turn on the
extent to which both teacher and position are clearly understood, an important re-
sponsibility devolves upon the school.
PRESENT METHOD OF RECOMMENDING- TEACHERS
In Missouri this responsibility is actually much more lightly felt than might at
first be supposed. Reference has already been made to the fact that the normal schools
have never had serious difficulty in placing their students;1 so great is the economic
pressure that their chief concern is to keep students from taking positions before com-
pleting the curricula. Furthermore, the nature of the preparation offered reduces the
problem of adjustment to a minimum. Both in theory and practice the training has
been " general," with no particular position or set of conditions in view. Brief con-
ferences with the superintendents in the twenty-five largest towns and cities of Mis-
souri made it entirely clear that most of these men expected their teachers to receive
their specific training after they engaged them. The normal schools had given them
perhaps two years of general studies, had exercised little discrimination or selection
in passing them thru,2 and now turned them over to the superintendents to discover
what sort of teaching each could best do. To send to a normal school for a trained
and tested fourth or seventh grade teacher was not the custom; the superintendents
said they would be glad to do so, but were skeptical of the ability of the schools to
supply them.
Under these circumstances it is evident that the methods of the ordinary employ-
ment agency are sufficient : bring the parties together to determine certain items of
appearance, personality, and address; make assurance of good character, intelligence,
and industry, and if salary and location are satisfactory, the thing is done. In the
case of high school teachers, the amount of study in certain departments may be con-
sidered, but this is not always indispensable. Neither from the normal school appoint-
ments committee nor from the superintendents themselves could it be discovered that
the latter enquired into the record of the candidate in practice teaching, or felt that
to be any criterion of future success.
DEMAND FOR TEACHERS NOT YET SPECIALIZED
It must be admitted that the normal school's vagueness of training and imperfect
knowledge of the candidate are probably fully duplicated in the uncertainty on the
part of many superintendents and board members as to the exact qualities needed. In
the case of board members the situation is, of course, hopeless ; such officials ought
never to be in a position to choose a teacher. Superintendents, as members of the same
craft, are likely to be fair judges of general characteristics, but the great majority of
superintendents with whom the normal schools come in contact are without supervis-
ory training and usually without genuine supervisory experience. They have been pro-
1 See page 326. 2 See pages 321 ff.
GRADUATION, CERTIFICATION, AND APPOINTMENT 351
moted often without special study, and invariably without special examination or
license, from teaching positions to their present places, where some teaching is still
often expected of them in addition to conducting the school and handling the disci-
pline, the parents, and the board. For such men the successful teacher is preeminently
the best "tactician," as one normal school president expressed it, — the teacher who
takes care of her own troubles, keeps harmony with the parents, and pleases the direc-
tors. It need hardly be said that these traits may and do frequently occur quite inde-
pendently of the abilities necessary in a thoroughly informed and skilful classroom
teacher, and until supervision is more highly refined than it is to-day, they will con-
tinue to be first in demand.
The conditions of employment above described actually fit a small proportion of the
cases. For a superintendent to appear at the normal school in person and select his
teachers is an advanced development ; they usually write, and selection is then made
between rival applicants locally, where school directors may add their discretion to
suggestions of the superintendent. Sometimes the normal school is simply asked to
"send over some one," who is forthwith accepted on faith. In all these cases the writ-
ten recommendations of the school touching general qualities are of value as before,
but the result in respect to specific abilities as a teacher tends to become still more
of a lottery than ever.
The machinery for placing students is in general the same at the different schools.
An appointments committee, including or perhaps headed by a member of the train-
ing department, has charge of applications and recommendations. A blank filled out
by the student, as in teachers' agencies, is the chief feature of the plan. So far as could
be learned, judgments and suggestions are made, except at Warrensburg, on a wholly
informal basis, sometimes by a single member, sometimes by a consensus of several
teachers, but without any carefully defined method or technique. In some cases no
stenographer or assistant was furnished the officer doing the work, and the latter was
obliged to spend many hours each week laboriously handling the correspondence
besides doing full work in the classroom. The organization of the data seemed to be
most complete and systematic at Warrensburg, where filed confidential statements
from various teachers as to the candidate's special characteristics and abilities were
kept available for immediate reference. Here, also, an attempt was made to secure
from superintendents in the district an annual rating of the normal school graduates,
but no important use had apparently been made of the returns.
IMPROVEMENTS NEEDED IN SYSTEM OF APPOINTMENTS
There is no doubt that the present system of student recommendation and appoint-
ment from the normal schools could be greatly improved. At present it Is largely a
hit-or-miss process, well meant and helpful as far as it goes, but proceeding upon too
few data, indifferently organized, and regarded as incidental rather than as a funda-
mentally important aspect of the school's work. In a strictly professional school there
OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
is every reason why each Instructor should consider a student primarily as a prospec-
tive teacher, and should contribute in a simple but definite form, his judgment as to
that student's qualifications for teaching. To form such judgments intelligently is
one of the chief things that the state should expect of a normal school teacher, and a
major reason why he should be educated for the purpose and chosen with care. His
work is not completely finished until the training given is successfully operative with
children, and he should contribute thereto by recognizing and assisting in a proper
disposition of his students' abilities. To be sure, the lack of competent supervision and
the blindness of employers to essential conditions of good service are difficult to com-
bat, but a highly organized normal school can have enormous effect in opening the
eyes of board members, and in disciplining careless superintendents. A clear know-
ledge of a teacher's real qualities, personal visitation and study of her position and sur-
roundings, if necessary, and a determination to" bring bad conditions and ignorant
or unprofessional treatment frankly and publicly to light in her defence, are simply
routine duties on the part of a normal school that rises fully to its opportunity. For
the normal school is the chief and usually the only professional critic, counselor, and
inspirer in its entire district.
NORMAL SCHOOL RESPONSIBLE FOR TEACHERS IN SERVICE
No such agency can stand apart. The public schools are its real classrooms and lab-
oratories. Its hold upon the teachers, and its power to do favors by sending good
'speakers to the various communities and by giving sound expert advice, enable it to
exert a large and beneficent influence that is all the greater because it is informal and
unofficial. "Local conditions" are but concrete professional problems to be steadily
analyzed and solved. The normal school should be the unremitting educational leader
at these points, assuming a tactful initiative for the sake of its students, where low
standards or opposition prevail. Such service demands the attention of the most skil-
ful and experienced persons that the school can command. The proposal has been made
elsewhere1 for prolonged visits or exchanges on the part of normal school teachers in
schools of the district, and the further suggestion was made of a special officer on each
staff with field duties of a purely educational nature.2 The scheme for apprenticeship
alluded to in the foregoing section would contribute greatly to bringing the normal
school and the schools in the surrounding region together. With such contacts fully
established, the conditions and problems of each school in the district would be clearly
understood and intelligently provided for at the normal school, thus completing the
natural circuit of the institution's activity, and binding the several communities to
its support. It would be better in the end, certainly, for a given normal school to de-
velop fruitful relations such as these with the schools dependent wholly upon it for
guidance, than to use up its funds on a program of internal expansion merely to meet
the competition of other normal schools or to impress the public.
1 See page 282. 2 See page 255.
ADMINISTRATION AN ELEMENT IN THE CURRICULUM 353
9. The Quality of Normal School Administration as an Element in the Normal
School Curriculum
It would be easy and proper to criticise the conduct of the Missouri normal school
from a purely practical point of view, and to show that, while doing commendable
work in many respects, several of them have failed to apply well-known principles of
good business management to their educational proceedings. But the more significant
aspect of the matter lies much deeper. Public education in which the students trained
in these schools will participate as teachers is largely a product of institutions organ-
ized in all essential respects on forms closely parallel to these normal schools ; rela-
tions between teachers and pupils, studies, recitations, and credit are all fundamen-
tally the same in elementary schools, high schools, and normal schools. Nothing is
more certain, therefore, than that the institutional treatment to which these prospec-
tive teachers are subjected during their preparation will reproduce itself with unerr-
ing fidelity in the schools which they control later. Just as the young teacher's teach-
ing equipment is borrowed largely outright from his own favorite teachers, so his
notions of management, his ideals of values, his conceptions of intellectual honesty
and right are framed not half so much by the texts he studies as by the experience
that actually shapes his own progress. What chance with him has a book's paragraph
on school ethics against a teacher or president who out of sympathy, laziness, or self-
interest gives him credit for two-thirds of a course that he has not taken ? A plea on
the score of "experience" brings in added grades, the desire of the school for another
"A. B." remits still further obligation, and the downfall in that student's educational
morale is complete; education for him, whether as high school teacher or as superin-
tendent, henceforth means juggling of just that sort. Or possibly he is so fortunate
as to go later to another and different school that imparts a bit of experience in its
avowed ideals with every student contact and requirement. Then comes disillusion
as to his earlier training. If presidents, whose judgment has overshot the mark of
"justice to the individual merits" of their students, could hear what their enlight-
ened graduates later say and write of these honors for which they have bartered,
they would lose faith in their ability alone to apply that principle. One does not
deride a reward justly deserved.
Less fundamental but exactly similar is the effect of the whole machinery of ad-
ministration. Classes with wide extremes of age, attainment, and experience represent
a thoroughly bad example of classification. For this reason, if for no other, a train-
ing school should refuse to tolerate situations that may soon come to be considered
by the students as normal. Overloading, lack of sequence in courses, lack of coher-
ence in curricula, all react inevitably on the student's general ideal and feeling for
good educational practice. An inadequate record system and its slovenly adminis-
tration1 or the unbusinesslike making and shifting of schedules at the beginning of
1 In going thru normal school credentials at the university there was discovered a set of three statements of a stu-
dent's work covering the same period : one by the student from his credit cards and two by the president of the
354 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
a term Is a constant model of confusion, and proclaims an Institutional dulness that
ought not to exist. Even in a trade school all these things are important because of
their immediate effect, but in a normal school they are vital because they are so In-
evitably and widely circulated as ideals that are educationally correct or tolerable.
Properly valued, such elements are quite as essential features of the curriculum as the
formal courses themselves, and should be given quite as careful attention.
As a result of failure to perceive these points, it must be admitted frankly that the
work of the schools as a whole impresses the candid observer with a pervasive " soft-
ness." By the tradition bred partly of political dependence they have sought to make
rosy the path of the individual student instead of centring their thought on train-
ing him vigorously for the service of the state. When nothing is required for admis-
sion, when thorough examinations and tests are heavily discounted, when almost no
one fails to pass, when a school must say "it is hoped that no student will so mix his
courses that there will be more than two years (!) difference between any of the courses
that he takes ; " when it gives a student his diploma, but warns him not to present
it at other institutions because they will not honor it; when, believing in the rule, It
is unable to insist that men and women students should not room in the same house,
and when it lets its meagre fees run indefinitely for fear of entailing hardship — the
outcome must be a degree of spinelessness ill associated with rational discipline for
teachers of American youth.1 Strong and virile teachers arise, if at all, in spite of such
an atmosphere; certainly not because of it.
10. Recent Changes in the Institutions
It has been the aim of the foregoing sections to consider certain features of normal
school administration on the basis of the text provided by the Missouri schools when
the study began in 1914. Since that time certain very marked changes have taken
place without, however, impairing the validity of the original text for the present
purpose, namely, an analysis for general use of the problems of this type of higher
institution as presented currently by a typical state. Nevertheless, in justice to the
institutions these changes should receive more than passing notice.
It should be said at once that no one of the modifications that has occurred has
resulted directly from official recommendations arising from this study. When desired,
the members of the enquiry staff discussed their observations freely with the teach-
ers and authorities, but only so. On the other hand, it would be remarkable if these
normal school, and all materially different! At the schools it was a common experience to have the president and
dean, or committee-man, arrive at quite different results in interpreting the same record.
1 An interesting illustration of this temper occurred in collecting- data for the present study. It was desired to hear
from every teacher and every student. Responses from the teachers were finally secured with few exceptions after
correspondence lasting1 over two years, but the student data were never completely gathered. At three of the schools
it was necessary to go thru the whole process of printing, distributing, and collecting student cards twice in order
to get a good proportion. At the state university, on the other hand, the request was made once and every student
card was in hand within a week, and a card from every instructor within three weeks, both collected by the insti-
tution itself without further mention of the matter.
RECENT CHANGES 355
informal discussions, the careful gathering of particular kinds of data,, and the em-
phasis upon certain difficult problems, had no effect in hastening changes for which
the institutions had long been ripe. The most notable of these is the voluntary coordi-
nation of all the institutions., including the university and state department, in the
administrative agreement described elsewhere.1 Upon the basis of certain mutually
accepted standards of work the interchange of credit is established, the normal schools
and the university thus healing a breach of long standing. These standards concern
chiefly the training and program of teachers, the admission, classification, and pro-
gram of students, the differentiation of secondary and collegiate work, as well as of
elementary and advanced collegiate work. They are without exception in the direc-
tion of progress from earlier conditions, and may signify an epoch-making change in
the conduct of the schools. How completely these new standards are now enforced,
and with what result, it would be impossible to say without reexamining the schools,
but general indications are exceedingly favorable. In the matter of records, too, Kirks-
ville, Warrensburg, Springfield, and Mary ville have undergone extensive transfor-
mation, utilizing the results of experience drawn from the enquiry. Cape Girardeau
already had an excellent system which it had^only partially utilized.
The tone of a critical study may be of so gray a cast as unfairly to obscure great
merits which, exist and in fact predominate. The danger in this case would perhaps
not have been so great, had not the schools of their own motion challenged technical
comparisons which they were at many points quite unprepared to meet. However, the
essential soundness of these schools and their great service to the state can scarcely
be exaggerated. The school at Kirksville represents a precious original tradition of
courage and progress in education. It has on its faculty an exceptionally large num-
ber of gifted teachers — a fact for which its leader is as completely responsible as for
its gross defects. One could admire the reckless vigor with which the school has so
persistently courted expansion, had the methods used been more scrupulous. From
an administrative point of view its practices should be overhauled. Warrensburg, of
the three original schools, has clung most consistently to Its task, the making of
teachers — an attitude moulded and fixed by its clear-sighted president for a quarter
of a century, George L. Osborne. Its inward spirit and organization have placed it
more nearly than the others upon a level of true collegiate performance, tho this
fact has not been unattended by difficulties that might be less apparent under a
more autocratic system. The efforts of the school at Cape Girardeau have been ex-
pended upon a more difficult region than surrounds the first two schools, a region
that is much more rural and detached, and where, as at Springfield, there must be
endless accommodation to the individual. This aim has led both schools astray at
certain points. Cape Girardeau has, however, done its work with much devotion and
with skill, as the high rating of the practice school reveals. The institution breathes
the dignity and refinement of its beautiful buildings, and tho there is a touch of
1 See page 61.
356 OPERATION OF THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
pompousness In maintaining for years a " college department " with few or no one in
it, the vacant curriculum has at least been a symbol of aspiration. Springfield in a
dozen remarkable years has developed a reservoir of fine educational ability hitherto
almost untouched and of priceless value to the state. The zeal and self-sacrificing
dedication to needy youth exhibited by certain members of this faculty are beyond
praise, tho this trait is not by any means confined to Springfield. The achievement of
the practice school in the place it holds in the larger institution and in the quality
of its product deserves special commendation. Owing to various vicissitudes the school
at Maryville has but recently found its true pace. With an equal chance it should
match the other schools, tho one cannot but regret that this school, with Its choices
till recently still before it, should have set Itself merely to duplicate the others, rather
than to try what intensive labor on a clear, restricted, well-planned program would do.
IX
PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
IT Is difficult to devise a definition of the "product" of the normal school in Mis-
souri. Among teachers now in service attendance at a normal school varies from one
to twenty-five terms. The name "graduate" has usually been reserved for those who
completed the old four-year curriculum — at first a purely secondary curriculum, but
since 1900 gradually approaching the equivalent of two years of collegiate work.
On either side of that point, however, certificates or diplomas have been granted, if
desired, at the end of each year, giving the student a worse or a better right to use
the term "graduate" as his interests might dictate. If those completing the two-year
collegiate or "sixty-hour" curriculum be counted as standard graduates, the schools
together show thirty-seven per cent of this grade or above during the past fourteen
years. Warrensburg leads the list with a total of forty-four per cent, and a recent
production of over one-half.
The more important question is not how many have been in or thru the normal
school, but rather, what is the nature and extent of the contribution made by nor-
mal schools to the improvement of instruction in the public schools of Missouri.
This question has been approached from two points of view : one, an examination of
the destination and performance of the groups of graduates as they leave the schools,
and the other, a study of the product of the schools as it exists in the teaching pop-
ulation of the state. The first is necessarily partial, and because of defective records,
is limited to small tho representative numbers ; the second supplements the first with
a cross-section of the entire service for which the schools prepare.
A. NORMAL SCHOOL GRADUATES OF 1915
Of students leaving the Missouri normal schools1 in 1915 with diplomas and cer-
tificates of various grades and expecting to teach, over one- third went into the same
county or adjoining counties, and another third into other counties in the district.
Seven per cent left the state ; these were chiefly from the two-year group, of which
they numbered fourteen per cent, and from the three-year group, nine per cent. It is
surprising to see how closely the four-year graduates clung to the vicinity : aside from
seventeen per cent employed immediately by the normal schools, nearly two-fifths
taught in the same or the next county, outdoing all but the rural certificate teachers
in this respect, and giving further evidence of the largely local appeal made by these
advanced curricula.
If all the students sent out be grouped by occupation, the disposition of the vari-
ous classes of graduates becomes highly significant.2 It seems that over one- third of
1 The information from Maryville -was too fragmentary to be of use.
2 See table, page 438.
358 PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
them go into rural schools — probably an understatement of the fact, for the defi-
cient records are chiefly in the low grades that swell this group and the next. This
should receive passing emphasis, for many normal schools, those of Missouri included,
have been much criticised for not attending to the rural school problem. A record of
one- third of the students receiving certificates sent into rural schools would not be
a bad showing if it could be said that these teachers were prepared expressly for their
work, and were not en route to other positions in preparation for which the rural
schools are furnishing the funds. Graded schools take at least forty-four per cent, and
probably would be shown to take nearer one- half, if the records were complete. Those
who teach in high schools number one-sixth of the total. As high school teachers are
almost invariably known and reported, this is undoubtedly a maximum proportion.
The returns are full of peculiar revelations. With the exception of rural school
teaching, all grades of instruction are represented in each of the collegiate graduat-
ing groups. One-sixth of the rural certificate graduates (secondary) have crept into
graded schools, while almost three-fifths of the collegiate one-year students are so
located. Less than two-fifths of those teachers who go into graded elementary schools
are equipped with the minimum two-year collegiate training for that service. The
high school situation is especially interesting : over two- thirds of the normal school
"graduates" in high schools have had but one or two years of collegiate preparation.
The administrative group is equally deficient: only one-sixth of the forty- two so-
called " superintendents ??1 possess the equivalent of a college education. The " thirty-
hour "or one-year collegiate class boasts eleven high school principals and seventeen
elementary school principals. These high school officials, to be sure, are chiefly teach-
ers, and are in third class or unclassified high schools. Nevertheless, they aspire to offer
a year or two of secondary work and to pose as heads of schools, while possessing but
half the professional training of good elementary teachers. The grades into which nor-
mal school graduates go were indicated in nearly three-fourths of the cases and show
an almost equal distribution. This was to be expected in such a group from the fact
that the majority of them are already experienced teachers and have left the interme-
diate grades where they began their work. About fifty-two per cent were teaching more
than one grade.
A more minute analysis of the high school group shows that if we ignore the small
number — ten per cent — that leave the state to teach in high schools elsewhere, the
remainder are divided almost equally between first class high schools and others.
The former deserve particular attention. One-sixth of the number have a standard
preparation of four years, but nearly as many — fourteen per cent — have had but
one year of collegiate work. It is hard to believe that fifty-eight per cent of all the
teachers sent into first class four-year high schools from the normal schools in 1915
had but one or two years of collegiate training — an average of less than is to-day
required in a first class elementary school teacher.
1 The titles used are those current at the schools for the positions in question and not the choice of the candidates.
NORMAL SCHOOL GRADUATES OF 1915 359
As the "principals" and others giving no record as to what subjects they were
teaching were nearly all in third class or unclassified high schools, it may be assumed
that they taught more than one subject. On this basis sixteen per cent only of the
total number of graduates teaching in high school taught one subject alone, and
rather oddly about the same proportion holds for the graduates of each curriculum
except the four-year group9 of whom twenty- two per cent taught one subject only.
The combinations of subjects taught in the classified high schools in 1917 are listed
in the Appendix.1 As a large proportion of teachers there listed in single subjects
are in St. Louis and Kansas City, the duty of the normal schools to give those who
are to teach in high schools a good preparation in at least two subjects would seem
apparent.
RELATION OF SALARIES TO TRAINING
To complete this brief description of the normal school graduates during the year
in question, account should be taken of the salaries attached to the positions to which
they go. In the absence of a complete record the tendency is probably to rate sala-
ries too high, for the good fortune of well-paid graduates is better news at a school
than the low or average wage of the less successful. Reports were secured from 102&
of the 1225 graduates known to be teaching. The schedule of their incomes shows the
consistent effect of training on salary; the median monthly salaries thru the succes-
sive curricula are: rural certificate, men $50, women $50; one-year collegiate, men
$70, women $50; two-year, men $75, women $55; three-year, men $85, women $60;
four-year, men' $105, women $65. This last group is comparable with the university
group at the same stage, in which the median salary for men rises to $118 and for
women to $71. 2
Rearranging the data on the basis of the kind of positions taken, the following
result is secured :
Men
Number Median General Median
Rural Schools 80 $50 $47
Graded Schools ,53 65 \ 64
Principals 22 75J
High Schools
First Class 38 75 94
Second Class 6 953\ 75
Third Class 13 853/
Unclassified 15 75 75
Women
Number Median General Median
m, %} -
54 65 70
60
17 601
19 55J
10 63s 55
Comparison with the general median of salaries is not fully justified, as the normal
1 See page 440.
2 Median initial salaries of 60 men and 127 women graduating from the University of Missouri in 1913, 1914, and
1915.
3 Apparent inversions of the expected order are due to the fact that teachers in the lower class schools are more
f\f+a,i\ T%vir»/"«irvalc Ct O WAll
often principals as well.
360 PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
school product is on the whole younger and less experienced. It is experienced to a
considerable extent, nevertheless, and on that account cannot fairly be compared with
the wholly untried teacher.
NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY
A certain number of normal school students go each year to study at other schools.
No attempt was made to trace these students except at the University of Missouri,
where they are most numerous, and where a convenient feature of the records made
an estimate of their standing an easy matter. It is the custom to assign additional
credit for work rated A^ and to subtract credit for work rated lower than B. In re-
cording this gain or loss use is made of a credit index, which represents the propor-
tion of total credit earned with reference to the normal credit hours of the courses
taken. Thus a student rated B throughout would be indexed as normal, or 1009 be-
cause his earned credit and the credit hours of his courses are identical.
In 1912-15, two hundred ninety-nine students who had previously attended Mis-
souri normal schools were registered at the university. Of these, seven per cent showed
the normal index — that is, had done average work rated B in all their courses. Thirty
per cent were below and sixty-three per cent were above normal. The average of
the entire group is almost exactly normal, showing that the quite good work of the
majority was nearly offset by the very poor work of the minority. The median index,
however, is 102.9, or nearly three points better than normal.
Nearly three-fifths of the number were men — a noteworthy fact? considering how
largely women predominate in the normal schools, and further evidence of the mo-
tive underlying male attendance there. They show a median of 102.1 as compared
with 104.9 among the women. Two-thirds of them had graduated at the normal
school (two-year collegiate course), and a larger proportion of the graduates than of
the non-graduates stood high at the university. It is noticeable, however, that with
the exception of students from Cape Girardeau, the non-graduate men who stood
high, stood much higher than did the graduate men who were above normal.2 This
may indicate that altho a larger proportion of the non-graduating men who try to do
university work are unfitted for it, those who are fitted for it do better work the ear-
lier they go to the university. Evidence from a larger number of cases is needed to
confirm such a conclusion.
The figures given seem to show that, all told, the students sent to the university
from the normal schools represent a good grade of material, altho they do not win
such uniformly high rank as the normal schools are inclined to maintain. It is com-
monly stated that only the best students from the normal schools go to the univer-
sity at all. To test this, the lists were submitted to the normal schools for ratings
1 These are not the literal ratings applied at the University of Missouri, but are used here for the convenience of
the reader. A indicates the highest mark and includes the ratings "excellent" and " superior" at the university.
2 Twenty-three non-graduates show a median of 109.2 as compared with seventy-six graduates with median at
106.6.
TEACHERS IN RURAL SCHOOLS 361
from their records with the following results:1 In a grouping with three degrees of
ability, A^ B> and C, just two-thirds were assigned to the middle group and one-
fifth were rated A ; not quite one-eighth were rated C9 and one per cent were consid-
ered failures. Among the undergraduates one- tenth only were rated A> while of the
graduates one-fourth were so rated, two-thirds falling in the B group in each case.
On the whole, the university and the normal schools agree rather closely in rating this
group of students : both consider them above, altho not greatly above, the average,
B. NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENTS AMONG THE TEACHING POPULATION
A more reliable and comprehensive idea of the service of the normal schools in the
state may be gained by a study of the present teaching population. Material for this
is available in the statistical returns gathered by the Foundation from most of the
twenty thousand teachers in the state. These returns show the actual present con-
tribution of all the normal schools together, as well as that of each separate insti-
tution, both as to quantity and, roughly, as to quality in so far as this can be measured
by salary levels. The latter are now (1919) somewhat higher than in 1915 when these
data were gathered, but the relative conditions are probably much the same.
1. Teachers in Rural Schools
Defining "rural teachers" as teachers in charge of more than three grade groups
in one schoolroom, there are approximately ten thousand five hundred rural teachers
in Missouri,2 Of this body of teachers about eight thousand three hundred replied to
the enquiries of the Foundation, giving the important facts regarding their prepara-
tion and service.3
The general level of training beyond the elementary school among these teachers
is indicated in the following table :
None Less than Less than Less than Less than Four Five Six Seven
one two three four years years years years
year years years years or more or more or more
Men 4 19 42 62 75 17 8 3 1
Women 2 11 26 44 58 32 10 3 1
Both 3 13 30 49 J53 28 9 3 1
100%
1 It should be said that while the university ratings are precise, the normal school ratings were based upon a sim-
ple inspection of the total record.
- The number of "country" teachers, as that term is understood by the state department, was 9990 in 1914-15. As the
term is used in this study, "rural teacher" applies to any teacher in charge of more than three grade groups m
one schoolroom. There proved to be 434 of these among the replies from ' graded1' schools, and they were added to
the rural group, of which they formed about five per cent. If 9990 be increased proportionately, we arrive at 10,515 as
the number of rural school positions by this definition, of which perhaps one per cent are filled by colored teachers.
3 Data from rural teachers were gathered in two ways: (1) on cards mailed to nearly ten thousand teachers indi-
vidually in the spring of 1915. Of these 5083 were returned. (2) On blanks filled by tneteachers attending the county
institutes in the fall of 1915 or secured from them by the county superintendents. These furmshed 6045 replies of
which 1851 were from teachers who had previously written cards, and may be reckoned with either group. Included
in the above is a group of 434 graded school teachers who were in charge of more than three grades and were con-
PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
Somewhat less than two-fifths have a complete secondary education or more; less
than one-tenth have as much as one year's training beyond this. Half of the entire
number and three-fifths of the men have from nothing at all up to a fraction over two
years of high school training. The men teachers, who constitute twenty-eight per cent
of the total, are conspicuously inferior to the women at nearly every point.
The share of different institutions in producing the situation above shown is readily
determined. Fewer than half — men, forty-one per cent; women, fifty per cent — of the
rural school teachers of Missouri report attendance at any of the state normal schools,
altho an additional ten per cent claim some normal school experience which cannot be
definitely assigned. The contributions of the several schools take the following order : 1
Cape Girardeau, six per cent; Maryville, seven per cent; Kirksville, nine per cent;
Springfield, ten per cent; and Warrensburg, fifteen per cent ; total, forty-seven per cent.
Forty-three per cent of the teachers had no normal school training, but eight per cent
had passed thru high school training-classes, and three per cent had taken some col-
legiate or university work. The remainder, approximately one- third in all, had high
school or elementary school training only.2 One per cent gave no statement of training.
The duration of normal school attendance on the part of rural teachers is more
significant than the proportion who have been merely enrolled. Two-thirds of these
have attended not over nine months, one-fifth from ten to eighteen months, and the
remainder for periods up to six years. Over one-half of the entire number indicating
normal school attendance have been there but six months or less, one-third but three
months or less — usually a summer session. The median attendance is the same for
both men and women — six months. Inspection of this group with reference to its
total schooling shows a median, in the case of men, of two years beyond the eighth
grade, and in the case of women, of three years; the median attendance for the group
is three years. We are dealing, therefore, with a set of teachers whose characteristic
representative has attended a high school for between two and three years, and has
taken six months of farther secondary training together with some professional courses
at a normal school.
Tho the normal school training is thus exceedingly brief, it is instructive to observe
its evident influence as shown in the scale of salaries that it commands. Eighty-five
per cent of those who have attended the state normal schools for whatever period
are receiving more than forty dollars per month, as compared with sixty-six per
cent in the case of high school graduates only, and fifty per cent in the case of high
school non-graduates. The persistence of the tradition of higher salaries for men
comes to light in the fact that six per cent more men than women receive over forty
sidered as rural teachers. Altho the combined groups represent 8277 different individuals who taught in the rural
schools in the course of some eight or ten months, some of these were the successive incumbents of the same posi-
tions. To maintain the representative distribution, therefore, the two groups have been considered separately. The
facts quoted in this section were derived from the second set of returns, and are for the first half of the school
Fear 1916-16.
1 The several normal school districts contain the following proportions of the state's rural population ; Cape Girar-
deau, 25 per cent ; Springfield, 21 per cent; Kirksville, 21 per cent ; Warrensburg, 18 per cent; Maryville, 15 per cent.
8 High school graduates, 8 per cent; non-graduates, 19 per cent; elementary school only, 4 per cent.
TEACHERS IN RURAL SCHOOLS 368
dollars per month, altho eleven per cent more women than men have had training
either at normal schools or in training classes.
The influence of the normal schools among rural teachers, meagre as it is in amount,
is further weakened by conditions of legislation. The state still maintains a third
grade certificate of exceedingly low standard available thru eight successive years by
repeated examination.1 This operates to postpone normal school attendance or other
training to the last possible moment or shortly before the candidate is "promoted19
to a graded school, if he continues to teach at all. Consequently, instead of getting
the benefit even of such training as these teachers appear to have, from the begin-
ning of their service, the schools reap the advantage of the skill that is acquired only
toward the end of each teacher's career. This fact stands out when one examines the
list of inexperienced teachers holding their first positions. Among the teachers re-
porting for 1915-16, twenty-four per cent had never taught before, and of these
fewer than one- third had ever attended a normal school, the proportion falling as
low as twenty-eight per cent and twenty-five per cent in the Kirksville and Cape
Girardeau districts. In other words, two-thirds, and in the two districts mentioned
three-fourths, of the new rural teachers were unprepared workers except for the con-
tribution of the high school training-classes. These little institutions have been strug-
gling bravely with the problem in spite of the handicap of immaturity in their pupils
and limited facilities. As compared with eight per cent in the entire number of rural
teachers they account for eighteen per cent of the inexperienced group, contributing,
as extremes among the five districts, thirty-one per cent and seven per cent respec-
tively to the Kirksville and Cape Girardeau districts referred to above.
It may be noted that even among wholly inexperienced teachers, the individuals
with normal school training show that they can immediately command relatively
better salaries. Comparing teachers having from one to four years of high school
education, including the training-class graduates, with those having the correspond-
ing amount of training, all or part of which has been in normal schools, the propor-
tions receiving over forty dollars per month are as follows:
One year Two years Three years Four years Five years
From High School (90)a 13% (88) 26% (75) 36% (356) 61%
From Normal School (40) §8 (63) 52 (60) 60 (40) 73 (69) 77%
Age plays some part here; the student from the normal school is in general an
older person than the student from the high school. The proportions nineteen years
of age or less in the two series were :
One year Tico years Three years Four y eats Five years
High School 69% 79%8 68% 66%
Normal School 56 70 56 55 41%
1 See page 305, note.
2 The figure in parenthesis gives the number of cases.
8 The marked drop in age noticeable in the two-year group in each series may be referable to the hold of the two-
year high school idea on the regular, and therefore younger, student.
364 PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
Age is not decisive, however. In the normal school group, the teachers with two
years of training receive over forty-five dollars nearly as frequently as the four-year
high school graduates, yet seventy per cent of them are nineteen or less, while only
sixty-six per cent of the latter group are as young.
%, Teachers and Supervisors 'in Graded Elementary Schools
Rural teachers, as we have seen, constitute a homogeneous group. Teachers in
graded schools, on the contrary, are subject to conditions varying usually with the
size of the town or city in which they work. The great metropolitan centres, Kansas
City and St. Louis,, require separate consideration; the state normal schools have
affected these districts but slightly, claiming at Kansas City one-fifth and at St.
Louis only three per cent of the elementary teachers. The balance of the state con-
tains only three cities having a population of more than twenty-five thousand., and
exhibits everywhere very similar characteristics, altho a few of the larger school sys-
tems have been considered separately in certain respects.1 It is these towns and cities
of the state at large together with the rural districts, rather than the great centres,
that the state normal schools have served.
a. THE STATE AT LARGE (omitting St. Louis and Kansas City)
Outside of the two large cities, there were for our purpose in Missouri 3650 teach-
ing positions in graded elementary schools.2 Enquiries directed to teachers in these
positions brought replies from 2334, or sixty -four per cent, of those who were teach-
ing in the spring of 1915. Additional replies in the fall, including some from second
incumbents of the same positions, increased the number to eighty- two per cenfc of the
total, but the statements made below are based on the original group alone. The men
among them numbered seven per cent.
CONDITIONS OF TRAINING
Before proceeding to show the extent to which the normal schools had participated
in preparing this group of teachers, a general statement of their total education may
be of interest as indicating the level to which normal school activity is at present ad-
justed. Grouping teachers and principals3 together, the following proportions appear
in the successive degrees of training:
1 St. Joseph, Springfield, Joplin, Hannibal, Sedalia, Webb City, Carthage, and Webster Groves. With a view to mak-
ing this group representative of the size and development of the school systems rather than merely of the size of the
cities, the number of teachers in the system and the salary of the superintendent were also taken into account.
Nevertheless, all but the two last named are among1 the seven largest cities after St. Louis and Kansas City.
2 This number is 85.8 per cent of the estimated number of such teaching positions. The remainder are divided
among positions in colored schools, teachers of more than three grades m town or city schools, and a few teachers
in both graded and high schools ; these were not considered here,
3 A very few principals in the largest cities do supervisory work only ; the rest manage their schools as head
teachers under a superintendent.
TEACHERS IN GRADED ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS
365
Less than Less than Less than Less than
one two three
year years years
Larger Systems 2 8 14
Rest of State 4 13 25
Total 3 12 22
s than
four
tears
Four
to five
years
Five
years
or more
Six
years
or more
Seven
years
or more
Eight
years
or more
23
39
38
17
6
3
37
30
33
16
6
3
33
32
35
16
6
3
100%
One-sixth of these teachers possess what may be termed a standard preparation
for their work — two years of training beyond a high school course; one- third are
high school graduates only, or in some cases graduates who have had part of a fifth
year's work also; while another third are less than graduates, one-eighth of the entire
group having less than a two years' education beyond the elementary school in which
they are teaching. Conditions in the group of larger systems are somewhat better than
those existing In the remainder of the state.
Of these twenty-three hundred teachers about sixteen hundred, or nearly seven-
tenths, had come in contact with normal schools for a longer or shorter period, and
exactly two-thirds had attended the state normal schools of Missouri.1 It is with this
latter group that we are particularly concerned here.
The total training of the two-thirds who attended the Missouri state normal schools
contrasts favorably with the training of the remaining third, as one would expect ;
the proportion reporting a preparation of one year or more in advance of high school
is one- third larger, while those with less than a high school education are relatively
somewhat fewer. Teachers with seven and eight years of training, however, are rela-
tively more numerous among those not attending the normal schools; there are but
few of these all told — six per cent — and they are usually residents in college towns.
The individual normal schools exhibit wide divergence of contribution to this
graded elementary group. The numbers and proportions are as follows :
KIRKSVILLE WARRENSBURG CAPE GIRARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARYVTLLE Total
Larger Systems
Men
Women
Pop. of Dist.2
Rest of State
Men
Women
Pop. of Dist. s
Total
Men
Women
1
17
12
206
114
34%
3%
3%
55%
11
13
15%
12
897
19
511
34%
34%
17%
207
399
2 8%
"lS%
10
81
91
1465
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%
1 Other training represented in the group was as follows: ten per cent had done some collegiate work at a college
or university; thirteen per cent had done four years of high school work only, including five per cent who had
attended high school teacher-training classes; six per cent had less than a complete high school education, and a
few had special training.
* Proportion of the population in the eight larger cities contained within the respective normal school districts.
3 Proportion of the urban population only, excluding the eight cities, contained within the respective normal school
districts
366 PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
In furnishing teachers for the graded elementary schools, Warrensburg heads the
list. This school supplies over one-third of the teachers even for the large systems,
altho its district contains but nine per cent of their population. Part of this success
is doubtless due to convenient location. To the rest of the state Warrensburg and
Springfield contribute their own quotas and a margin for the other districts.
The duration of normal school attendance varies extremely. Approximately one-
fourth report attendance for a single term, altho three-fifths have attended for one
year or more, and one-fourth for two years or more.1 There are minor inter-school
variations due to the character of the students. Warrensburg and Springfield, for
example, show a briefer attendance than the others, probably because at these schools
the students in this group had longer high school training. The median length of
attendance is the same at each school — three terms or one year, except at Kirks ville
and Cape Girardeau, where it is four terms.2
In estimating duration of normal school attendance it is of prime importance to
distinguish between secondary and collegiate attendance. Single years or even single
terms of collegiate work should be worth more professionally than longer periods
devoted to secondary study. This distinction may readily be made on the basis of
the actual number of terms of work reported. For the five schools together these
amount to 5265 terms of normal school attendance, of which sixty-one per cent were
taken after four years of secondary work had been completed.3
Warrensburg and Springfield lead the other schools by a fair percentage in the
total, and the preponderance of collegiate work among their students employed in
the larger systems again shows the effect of longer high school preparation. The same
is true of those few from Cape Girardeau who teach in the larger systems, altho the
entire group who studied at Cape Girardeau did a smaller proportion of collegiate
work than was done at any other school.
When the total number of terms of collegiate work reported is apportioned among
the five schools, Warrensburg shows two and one-half times the amount of collegiate
work done either at Kirks ville or at Cape Girardeau, and Springfield has provided
nearly twice as much.4 If the average amount of collegiate work per student be con-
sidered, Maryville with almost four terms has a slight advantage, and is closely fol-
lowed by KirksviUe, which has much the highest average among its few representa-
tives in the larger systems.5
1 See page 4S8.
2 The same median holds good of those who have four, three, two, or one year of previous high school prepara-
tion. Among those with less than one year, it rises to six terms or two years of normal school attendance. Reported
high school preparation before coming: to the normal school divides almost equally in the group as a whole between
those who had four years of such training (fifty-one per cent) and those with less. Warrensburg and Springfield,
with fifty-six and fifty-seven per cent of high school graduates respectively, have the advantage over Cape Girar-
deau with thirty-seven per cent, Kirksville with forty-five per cent, and Maryville with forty-six per cent. The acces-
sibility of these first two schools to the larger high schools partially explains this; in fact, the distribution of the
teachers themselves is indicative: Springfield and Warrensburg together, owing to their location, furnish nearly
nine-tenths of the Missouri normal school product reporting from the eight larger systems, as compared with fifty-
three per cent of the teachers elsewhere.
3 See page 488. 4 See page 438. & See page 439.
TEACHERS IN GRADED ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS 367
CONDITIONS OF REWARD
Salary conditions among the state's elementary teachers in towns and cities1 afford
no reassuring evidence of public concern for the teacher's preparation. Out of the en-
tire group, which includes teachers in nearly two-thirds of the existing positions, those
who possessed what may at present be termed a good preparation for their work —
two collegiate years — and who received as much as $750 annually, numbered four-
teen men and eleven women, or one per cent of the total. Four times as many others
received as much money but had inferior training. The prevailing — median — annual
salary for all, trained and untrained alike, was $450, while more than one-fifth re-
ceived $360 or less.
The analysis of the relation between salary and training in this group of teachers
is not advantageous to the normal schools. Outside of the two great cities, sixty per
cent of all the graded elementary school teachers who never attended normal schools
received $450 or more, while but fifty-five per cent of the normal school group re-
ceived as much; ten per cent of the non-normal school group earned $750 or more,
while but three per cent of those who had attended normal schools did as well. When
compared with their normal school colleagues in the eight larger systems taken alone,
nearly twice as many of the teachers in the same systems, but without any normal
school training, received $550 or over (49 per cent — £7 per cent) ; and over three
times as many received $750 or over (27 per cent — 8 per cent).
Elsewhere in the state the conditions were not so unfavorable, but altho the normal
trained teachers had slightly fewer of the very low-paid positions — ten as compared
with thirteen per cent below $350 — the teachers without normal training outdid
them at nearly every other point in the comparison. As we have seen, the total train-
ing of the normal school group is somewhat longer, and presumably much better for
the purpose, than the preparation of the others, yet they receive consistently lower
salaries.
If the institutional grouping be dropped, and account be taken only of the total
amount of schooling, the situation just described is still apparent. In the small cities
and towns teachers with six or more years of training above the elementary school
do indeed draw higher salaries than those with less — twenty-two per cent as against
ten per cent among teachers receiving $550 or more. But in the eight larger systems,
where attendants of normal schools fared so poorly, thirty-two per cent of all teachers
with six or more years of training, regardless of institution received $550 or more
as compared with thirty-eight per cent of the teachers with less training who received
that salary.
It is evident from all the above figures that recognition of the value of the training
which the normal schools offer is exceedingly embryonic in the minds of those who
determine salaries. One would like to be able to show that the situation is only ap-
parent and temporary, on the ground that the development of professional training
1 Exclusive of St. Louis and Kansas City.
368 PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
is still too recent to dominate the age curve of the whole group. This is partly true,
for there appears, especially in the larger systems9 where those who attend normal
schools are noticeably fewer1 and where salaries are larger., a long line of older teachers
with little or no professional training.2 These teachers have displayed the qualities
hitherto regarded as desirable by their respective school boards, and have received
their promotions largely on the basis of prolonged tenure — a consideration against
which the best of training makes little headway.
But the consolations of this argument fail when it appears that the members of
the normal school group, even age for age, in spite of distinctly longer training, are
not receiving as high salaries as their colleagues who have not attended the normal
schools. In the larger systems thirty-seven per cent of the normal trained teachers
from ages twenty-one to twenty-five, inclusive, receive more than the median salary,
$450, as compared with fifty per cent of the others. Yet only forty-five per cent of
the latter have five years or more of training, while sixty per cent of the normal school
group have such training. In the twenty-six to thirty age group, thirty per cent of
those from the normal schools receive more than the median, $540, while sixty per
cent of the others receive more, altho only half as many of the latter have five years
or more of training. One- third of the normal trained teachers over thirty years of
age receive $600 or more, as compared with three-fourths of the others over that age.
The median salary for teachers above thirty is $555 if they come from the normal
schools, but $735 if they do not.
It is plain that the financially better elementary school positions are not open to
the normal school product. The cities with the higher salary schedules are taking
persons with but four years of schooling, usually directly from the local high schools,
and starting them in under the supervision of experienced principals. In fact, it is
probable that a large amount even of that normal school attendance which is re-
corded in this group consists of brief sessions taken ab intervals after considerable
experience has been acquired, instead of anything in the nature of systematic pro-
fessional preparation for the position. The reasons for this practice will be touched
upon later in summarizing the general situation.3
b. ST. Louis AND KANSAS CITY
The returns secured from elementary teachers in St. Louis and Kansas City were
for the first half of the school year 1915-16. Positions in St. Louis at this time
numbered 1789, and teachers in eighty-seven per cent of them replied to the Founda-
tion's enquiries. In Kansas City there were 779 positions, and ninety-five per cent of
them were represented by answers. Men constituted less than two per cent of the
1 Forty-four per cent of the teachers In the larger systems never attended a state normal school, as compared with
thirty per cent in the rest of the state.
* Of those in the larger systems never having attended normal schools, forty-two per cent are over thirty years of
age, while but twenty-nine per cent of the normal school group are as old.
3 See page S80.
TEACHERS IN GRADED ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS 369
group at St. Louis, and about four per cent at Kansas City. Three-fifths of the men
at St. Louis and all of those at Kansas City replied.
The reported secondary and higher schooling of the elementary teachers in the
two cities gave the following proportions:
Less than Less than Less than Less than Four Five Six Seven Eight
one two three four to five years years years years
year years years years years or more or more or more -or more
% % % % % % % % %
St. Louis 4 II 27 32 11 5T 41 7 3
Kansas City 3 8 15 S3 34 43 23 7 3
100%
According to these figures, St. Louis has the advantage of Kansas City in that nearly
twice as large a proportion of elementary teachers possess six years or more of training
above the elementary school, altho this distinction is offset, in part at least, by the
fact that at St. Louis a much larger proportion than at Kansas City have had less
than a high school education. While carrying along this large number — nearly one-
third — who with scarcely any training had nevertheless fitted themselves thru experi-
ence to do the work required of them, St. Louis has made a steady and notable cam-
paign for preparation of a truly professional character; Kansas City, on the other
hand, has secured at least a high school training in a greater majority of cases, but
has been less concerned with higher professional preparation. The age median is the
same in both cities — thirty-one.
Of the St. Louis elementary teachers, seventy- two per cent report attendance at
Harris Teachers College, which is the local city training school ; and an additional
seven per cent attended the St. Louis Kindergarten Training School. Slightly fewer
than three per cent had attended state normal schools.
The duration of attendance at these institutions varied widely. Nearly half of those
from Harris Teachers College had taken two or more years of work in advance of
high school graduation; this was true of about one-third of those from the St. Louis
Kindergarten, and of one-seventh only of those from state schools. One-fourth of those
from Harris Teachers College had done less than two years' work beyond high school.
All the rest had combined varying amounts of professional work with partial high
school courses.
The distribution of salaries in St. Louis in 1915-16 was apparently not favorable
to the normal school product. Considering the teachers from all these schools in one
group, and omitting such as hold part-time appointments, only twenty-four per cent
of their number were receiving more than $1030, as compared with forty-three per
cent of those who had attended none of these training schools. And this in spite of the
fact that over half of the former had had six years of secondary and higher training,
and nearly three-fourths had had five years or more, while of the latter group that had
not attended normal schools less than one-fourth had had five years, and one-sixth
only had had six years of training.
370
PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
The reason for this situation is clear. The non-training school group is relatively
small — eighteen per cent only of the total number of teachers. It consists of a few
with good training of standard character received elsewhere than in the local and
state schools^ and a large proportion whose training is very brief. The first are fairly
young; thirty-one years is the median age of those with six or more years of train-
ing above the elementary school, and they are receiving relatively high salaries as
teachers of special subjects not hitherto offered at the training schools in question.
Those with brief training are older; forty-two years is the median age for teachers in
this class with less than four years of secondary schooling, and these are receiving
relatively high salaries because of their senior status as teachers. It is evident, there-
fore, that the discrimination against the local normal school training is only ap-
parent; as teachers so trained attain longer experience, and as the schools themselves
develop their special departments, the higher salaries will presumably become avail-
able in greater proportion,
At Kansas City all local and state agencies together have trained but forty-one
per cent of the total number of elementary teachers. Training courses in Kansas City
are reported by twenty- two per cent and attendance at state schools by nineteen per
cent.1 Eighty-seven individuals, or twelve per cent of the total number, reported two
years or more of higher professional training in these Missouri schools, following
four years of secondary work. This is but slightly over half of the whole number
credited with such training. Almost one-third of the remainder attended school else-
where in Missouri, chiefly at the university, and two-thirds came from abroad, well
distributed over twelve states, of which Kansas sent the most.
The comparative salary situation in 1915-16 at Kansas City was the same as that
at St. Louis, but apparently requires a less favorable explanation. With part-time
kindergarten teachers omitted, the group in Kansas City that had never attended
either city or state normal schools was very large — sixty-four per cent of the total,
and age for age outranked the normal school representatives in salary as follows:
20 or less
21-35
26-30
31-35
36-40
41-45
46 or over
Receiving
over $600
over 650
over 900
over 950
1000 or more
1000 or more
1000 or more
Of those attending local
or Missouri State Normal Schools
Of the Remainder
53 of
52 of
54 of
54 of
70 of
81 of
81 of
30
69
33
21
67 of
93 of
65 of
73 of
83 of
80 of
95 of
88
56
65
54
60
Total over $750
Having five or more years of training
Having six or more years of training
57 of 233
63
84 of 411
10
In every age group but one the reward of the normal school product falls behind
1 Kirksville, two per cent; Warrensburg, fifteen per cent; Springfield, one per cent; and Maryville, one per cent.
TEACHERS IN GRADED ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS 871
that of teachers prepared elsewhere, or? most frequently, not at all. Yet the group from
the normal schools is overwhelmingly superior in amount of training ; the proportion
with six or more years of secondary and higher training is over three times as great
as it is among the others. To be sure the age of these well-trained teachers is low —
twenty-seven years in the group as a whole as compared with a general age median
of thirty-one, and twenty-four in the normal school contingent as compared with
thirty-five among those few with as much training from other sources ; but that fails to
account for the marked contrast within identical age groups where age arid teaching
experience run nearly parallel. The attendants at the state schools are in somewhat
better case than those from local normal and kindergarten schools, sharing the better
salaries on an almost even basis with the untrained whom they would be expected to
outdo.
Whatever be the cause, these students, in spite of their longer preparation, simply
do not attain the positions that the school authorities most largely reward. This may
be because the meagre type of training is not sufficiently convincing, or because con-
ditions in the school service are such as to reward routine conformity, and perfunc-
tory rather than intelligent teaching. The first is certainly the case to a considerable
degree, if the findings of this study may be trusted, and the second is by no means
impossible in a system that has for so long employed teachers with a minimum of
education.
Principals of elementary schools in large cities are of course school officers of the
first importance. The enquiries of the Foundation elicited response from eighty-four
per cent of those at St. Louis and from a similar proportion at Kansas City. The
status of formal preparation among these men and women exhibits comparative feat-
ures not unlike those discovered among the teachers over whom they preside.
Less than Less than Less than Leys than Four Five Six Seven Eight Total
one two three four to five years years years years Number-
year years years years years or more or more or more or more
% % % % % % % % %
St. Louis
Men 4 6 16 20 1% 68 59 43 33 49
Women 7 U 46 53 18 29 21 44- $8
i . r._. ... IL r j
100%
Kansas City
Men 5 5 16 79 47 32 21 19
Women S IS 25 41 41 IB 9 3 32
^ ..n ' _._ . j
100%
St. Louis principals include a larger proportion with advanced professional training
than do those of Kansas City; the latter, on the other hand, show fewer whose quali-
fications appear to depend so wholly upon experience.
At St. Louis two-thirds of the principals are men ; at Kansas City more than half
are women. Even so, the state and local normal schools are represented to almost
372 PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
exactly the same extent in each group — forty and forty-one per cent. At St. Louis
only six out of twenty-eight women principals report as much as two years of colle-
giate training, but all except six went to a normal school; at Kansas City three out
of thirty- two women principals had as much training, and only nine of the number
had attended a state or local normal school. Two-thirds of the men principals, how-
ever, at Kansas City had attended normal schools as compared with one-fifth only in
St. Louis.
Salaries show the customary lack of respect for normal school training, at least
among the women. At Kansas City men from normal schools receive as much as those
from outside — $£000. At St. Louis ten years' difference in ages — thirty-eight to
forty-eight — is doubtless a partial reason for the forty outsiders receiving $3000 as
compared with $2500 that is paid the nine normal school representatives. Another
and sufficient explanation is that the former are much more frequently college gradu-
ates. The outside group of women at Kansas City receive $1750 as compared with
$1700 paid to their normal school colleagues; and at St. Louis the six women not
from normal schools? with an age median of fifty-three years, receive $S425, while the
twenty- two women in the normal school group, with an age median of forty-eight,
receive only $1560. Only one of the six reported as much as one year of collegiate
training, while twelve of the twenty-two had one year, including five who had two
years of such training.
3. Teachers and Supervisors in High Schools
High schools in Missouri may be arranged in three groups: Fully state approved
four-year schools, termed Jirst class high schools ; partially approved three-year and
two-year schools, termed second and. third class high schools; and unclassified schools,
some of which are nevertheless allowed a certain number of approved credits. These
classes constitute a series of progressive stages in the development of a high school,
and imply to a degree a similar progress in the qualifications, salary, and prestige
of the persons who teach in them. That is to say, the typical third class school is
not merely half of a first class school equally well managed and equipped, but is usu-
ally inferior in personnel, equipment, and organization, even tho it satisfies the mini-
mum requirement of the state department of education.
a. THE STATE AT LA&GE
In 1915 there were eleven hundred sixty-four l teaching positions in classified high
schools outside of St. Louis and Kansas City, and ninety -two per cent of these were
represented in the replies filed for the enquiry. Fifty-nine replies from teachers in
1 This number Includes the principals in towns having superintendents. In towns not so provided the principals of
the high schools have been taken to represent the superintendents and will be studied in a latei section. They
number 321, of whom 246, or 77 per cent, responded to the enquiries of the Foundation. (See page 376.)
TEACHERS IN SCHOOLS 373
unclassified schools indicated some fourteen more positions than were known to the
state department. With such full representation, the information as to high school
teachers is probably as accurate as complete returns would make it.
Few high school teachers report less than a complete secondary course, and of these
over half had attended a normal school. About nine-tenths of the teachers in first
class schools had five or more years'* preparation ; close to one-half reported the full
eight years of a well-trained instructor. The stages of training beyond the elementary
school among teachers in all types of high school in the state at large appear in the
following table:
Less than Four to Five Six Seven Eight Nine Total
four five years years* years years years
years years or more or more or more or more or more
First Class
State at large % % % % % % %
Men 5 6 89 75 59 45 17 212
Women 5 6 89 78 69 44 13 626
Both 5 6 89 77 59 45 14 838
100%
Kansas City
Men 14 5 81 T4 69 56 34> 109
Women 11 15 7$ 63 55 48 18 130
Both IS 11 77 68 61 51 25 239
100%
St. Louis
Men 5 4 91 90 86 73 41 172
Women 11 3 86 81 70 62 24 157
Both 8 3 89 86 78 68 33 329
100%
Second and Third Class
State at large
Men 17 25 58 47 34 19 3 59
Women 9 11 80 67 36 20 4 177
Both 11 15 74 62 35 19 4 236
100%
State at large
Men 36 18 46 23 9 5 22
Women 8 22 70 51 32 14 37
Both 19 20 61 41 24 10 59
100% *
The amount of training falls off rapidly in the lower classes of schools, and the
training of the men, which in first class schools was slightly better than that of the
women, becomes markedly inferior in unclassified schools.
The crediting of training to different institutions,, or types of institutions, is com-
plicated by the considerable amount of transfer that has taken place, especially be-
tween the normal schools and the university. Twenty-eight per cent of all the teachers
in classified high schools have done collegiate work both in the Missouri state normal
schools and in colleges or universities, or in a few cases in other normal schools, either
within or outside of the state. Seventeen per cent, or one- sixth, did their collegiate
874 PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
work in a Missouri state normal school only, while forty-seven per cent,1 or nearly
one- half, did all of it elsewhere. Eight per cent reported no collegiate work ; slightly
over one-half of these had done their secondary work at a Missouri state normal
school. All told, fifty-two per cent1 of the teachers in classified high schools had at
some time attended one of the state normal schools. Eleven per cent did all of their
work at the state university, while more than one-third attended there.
The statements just made need immediate qualification, however, in view of the
wide disparity between the two types of institution as to the actual amount of work
done by the students in each. It is well also to consider the fully representative first
class schools by themselves in such a matter. In this group those who went only to
college or university numbered more than half,2 and two-thirds of them had eight
full years of training, while those prepared only by the normal schools numbered but
one-eighth, and three-fourths of them had but six years' schooling altogether. A com-
bination group that attended both normal school and college constituted twenty-
eight per cent, and one-third only had completed eight years of work. Six per cent had
done no collegiate work. It will be apparent, therefore, that the actual weight of
influence of the normal schools, as measured in school attendance, is relatively small
among first class high schools, altho it is by no means negligible.3
Among the second and third class schools the normal school, college, and com-
bined groups above distinguished are numerically more nearly equal, with the nor-
mal school group somewhat ahead, but here again the balance is considerably in favor
of the college group owing to longer attendance by its representatives.4
The numerical contribution of the different normal schools to the high school
staff of the state is extremely unequal and somewhat unexpected, as the two schools
that have long laid the greatest apparent emphasis on their facilities for preparing
high school teachers have proportionately fewer in actual service than the others.
Warrensburg heads the list, having enrolled over two-fifths of all the teachers in
first class high schools who attended normal schools at all.5 Together with Spring-
field, it accounts for fifty-seven per cent of these teachers, while Kirksville and Cape
Girardeau, with twenty-seven and eleven per cent respectively, contribute thirty-
eight per cent. Maryville's share is comparatively slight — five per cent.6
1 Includes three per cent who did secondary work at a normal school but collegiate work elsewhere.
2 See page 489.
3 The proportion of degrees shows the same general situation. One-fourth of the teachers hold only the two-year
normal school degree, and three per cent, the four-year normal school degree. From universities and colleges forty-
eight per cent hold four-year degrees, including four per cent with the master's degree.
4 In second and third class schools, two-fifths hold the two-year normal school degree, three per cent the four-year
normal school degree, while twenty-two per cent have four-year degrees from colleges or universities.
5 See page 439.
6 The median representative of each school has a total preparation of six years beyond the elementary school. At
Springfield, Kirksville, and Maryville nearly half had more than six years; at Warrensburg this proportion is three-
eighths, and at Cape Girardeau it drops to one-fifth. In most cases, of course, those who secured prolonged training
received the latter part of it at other institutions than normal schools. Nearly four-fifths of the group attending
normal schools have attended summer sessions, with a median of three sessions each, and about one-half have taken
four years of high school work before attending a normal school. Among first class schools this latter character-
istic varies from three-fifths at Springfield to one-third at Cape Girardeau.
TEACHERS IN HIGH SCHOOLS 375
The usual — median — period of normal school attendance on the part of teachers
in high schools of all classes was two years for women and three years for men. Kirks-
ville shows four years for men in first class schools. About one- sixth of the teachers
in first class schools who attended normal schools at all, attended for one or two terms
only, one-third for less than two years, and one-fourth for four years or longer. These
periods are for total attendance including secondary work.
The relative salary situation of the normal school representatives in high schools
is rather better than one would expect, considering the disparity in amount of train-
ing between themselves and the college contingent. The men of the group among
first class schools receive a median of $81 01 annually as compared with $850 for all
male high school teachers in such schools and $900 for all those who had attended
a college or university but not a normal school. The thirty men who attended only
normal schools received $700, while twenty-five who attended both a normal school
and the state university received $810, and eighteen who attended only the state
university received $875.
The median salary of all women teaching in first class high schools was $630,
and the women who had attended normal schools received the same.2 Those from the
state university without normal school attendance received $675, as did those who had
attended other schools. The ninety women trained only in the normal schools received
a median of $585, while those from the university only, or who had attended both,
received the general median of $630. Women from the normal school group with
seven or more years'* training received $675, as did those from the university group.
b. HIGH SCHOOL TEACHEIIS IN KANSAS CITY AND ST. Louis
The replies to the Foundation's enquiries from high school teachers in Kansas
City and St. Louis numbered ninety-eight and ninety-six per cent respectively out
of possible totals of two hundred forty-five and three hundred forty- three.
In Kansas City the general level of training of high school teachers is somewhat,
tho not greatly, above that prevailing among first class high schools in the remainder
of the state.3 At the same time the proportion of teachers with less than four years
of preparation above the elementary school is more than double. This is doubtless
due to a system of more permanent tenure whereby a teacher in a large city system,
once established, is likely to stay without obligations for further preparation, whereas
in small cities the freer conditions either improve or eliminate him, altho the maxi-
mum standard may not be so high. The same condition appears to a less extent in
St. Louis, Those in Kansas City who have eight years of training constitute fifty-one
per cent, as compared with forty-five per cent in the state at large, and sixty-eight
1 This was likewise the median for men from Kirksville. Those from Warrensburg and Springrfield received $900,
those from Cape Girardeau, $765, and those from Maryville (5)T $720.
2 The median among women teachers from Springfield was $675; from Maryville, $585,* elsewhere it agreed with
the common figure.
3 See page 373.
876 PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
per cent In St. Louis. In the total number with as much as five or six years9 prepa-
ration, Kansas City actually falls about ten per cent behind the remainder of the state,
tho this Is partly offset by those who have done graduate work. The distribution is
that of a city that has recently raised its standards, but for new appointees only.
In St. Louis more than two-thirds of the high school teachers show a complete
collegiate training, and half as many have done advanced study.1 2
The contribution of the state normal schools to the high school staffs of Kansas
City Is slight — -thirteen per cent.3 Seventeen per cent had attended the state uni-
versity. Here also there was much transfer from one institution to another; fewer than
half of these had done their collegiate work only at the university. Three per cent
had attended other Missouri institutions.
In St. Louis three high school teachers had at some time attended Missouri state
normal schools, but had received most of their training elsewhere. Harris Teachers
College had enrolled thirty -six, or eleven per cent, for short periods, but only six had
attended nowhere else. One-fourth of all the teachers had attended other Missouri
institutions, including six per cent who went to the University of Missouri.
Altho the number in the group is small (thirteen), it may be of interest to observe
that at Kansas City the median individual in the group of women teachers partly
trained at normal schools received $1450 as compared with $1200, the median salary of
all other women teachers. At St. Louis, likewise, the median individual among thirty-
three women partly trained at normal schools and Harris Teachers College received
S15SO, as compared with $1360, the median salary of other women teachers. Other
factors than mere attendance at these schools — often very brief — probably operated
to produce this result.
4. City and Town Superintendents4'
There were estimated to be five hundred thirty-eight positions for white superin-
tendents or head teachers in Missouri in 1915. The holders of eighty-three per cent
of these replied to the enquiries Issued by the Foundation. Of superintendents in
1 In Kansas City thirty per cent of the men and over half of the women teachers lack degrees of any kind. In St.
Louis these fig-Tires are sixteen and thirty-seven per cent respectively. Normal school degrees numbered six per
cent in Kansas City and two per cent in St. Louis.
2 See page 373.
3 One person with collegiate training secured solely at a normal school was teaching in Kansas City, altho a total
of thirty teachers had a part of their training at normal schools — twenty-five at Warren sburg, and five at Kirksville.
Seven had stayed as long- as two years. Only eleven of the thirty secured a full collegiate course in all ; eight others
did only secondary work at normal school ; the remainder had taken collegiate work in varying amounts in at least
two institutions.
* The responsible officer in a Missouri town or city school system is called the " superintendent " in nearly all dis-
tricts that maintain a first class high school and in some that do not. Where this is not the case, the local head is
termed a " principal," and the supervisory authority is technically vested in the county superintendent. In almost
four-fifths of the cases, however, even the " superintendent " is likewise a teacher, and purely supervisory duties
shade off imperceptibly into those of a head teacher as one goes down the list from large cities to small. It is rea-
sonable, therefore, by merging principals with superintendents, to consider these leading figures in the local organ-
izations in a single group. Classification according to the type of high school over which they preside brings out
clearly their essential traits. In the second and third class and in unclassified schools where these officers are the
chief teachers, the description of their training will serve as an important supplement to the treatment of the high
school teachers.
CITY AND TOWN SUPERINTENDENTS 377
districts containing first class high schools ninety-four per cent replied.1 The latter
are, of course, the best trained and best paid individuals of the group, and consti-
tute the educational leadership of the state so far as the public school organization
is concerned.
In general, the superintendents of school systems in Missouri possess the follow-
ing educational background of training in advance of the elementary school :
Less than
fo^tr
years
Four
years
Five
years
Or more
Six
years
or more
Seven
years
or more
Eight
years
or more
Nine
years
or more
Ten
years
or more
Total
First Class
Second & Third Classes
6
13
82
67
48
54
29
39
19
24,
4
8
1
144
150
11
23
66
100%
Unclassified
31
13
56
31
17
9
2
1
150
100%
The median number of years of training beyond the elementary school is seven in
the first group; two-fifths have had eight years, including one-fourth who have done
graduate work in addition. In the second and unclassified groups the median drops
to five years, but with a considerable difference within the group area, as is shown
by the difference in the proportions with six or more years of training.
It appears from the table that one-third of the school superintendents in charge
of so-called first class school systems have had, all told, not more than a four-year
high school course and one year in college or normal school after they left the eighth
grade; and among those presiding over second and third class systems more than
one-half are similarly equipped.2 Missouri has evidently laid little emphasis on school-
ing as compared with "practical experience" in selecting these officers.
The part played by the different agencies in accomplishing the training of Mis-
souri superintendents is difficult to describe accurately owing to the very general
intermixture of training received in various institutions. Among superintendents in
first class districts, one-tenth have attended neither normal school nor state univer-
sity; one-fifth attended the university only (five per cent), or the university and some
college, but no normal school; one- tenth attended only normal schools; just over
one-half attended both university and normal schools, and in a few cases, still other
institutions; and the remainder attended both normal schools and institutions other
than the university. Convenient summer sessions with their brief unit courses have
led to this wholesale migration — an important educative factor in itself, provided
1 From second and third class high school districts 80 per cent sent in answers, and from those with unclassified
schools, 77 per cent.
2 Degrees of any kind are lacking in 15 per cent, 29 per cent, and 64 per cent respectively, of the three groups of su-
perintendents under discussion. Two-year normal school degrees are held by 39 per cent, 52 per cent, and 24 per
cent, while 5 per cent, 4 per cent, and 4 per cent have taken four-year degrees from normal schools. College and
university degrees number 41 per cent, 15 per cent, and 8 per cent, including: 9 per cent, 1 per cent, and 1 per cent
who hold one-year graduate degrees ; there are no doctor's degrees.
378 PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
the work done does not degenerate Into mere desultory sampling of one school after
another.
The median years of work done at the normal schools by members of the first group
was three — most of it collegiate. Three-fourths of those attending did part of this
work in the summer in three and one-half summer sessions each; thus about one-
third of all their normal school work was done in this way, In Intervals of such study,
or after it, three-fourths of those who went to the normal schools took work at the
university also. This amounted to a little less than one year, and in two-thirds of
the cases was done only in summer sessions; hence the median schooling at normal
schools and university of those presenting this combination was nearly four years
divided as stated, and most of it of collegiate character. Those who did not attend
normal schools spent a slightly longer period at the university — in addition, of
course, to what other collegiate work they may have done elsewhere. The total col-
legiate training in the case of all those not attending the normal schools amounted
to three years. The median period of attendance at the university on the part of all
superintendents in first class districts who enrolled there was somewhat more than
one year.
KirksviUe and Warrensburg prepared by far the largest number of all superin-
tendents in first class districts enrolled in normal schools — sharing almost equally
four-fifths of the group. Maryville took four per cent, and the others divided the
remainder. Eleven individuals did their collegiate work wholly at KirksviUe and four
wholly at Warrensburg. Only seven of the one hundred three first class superin-
tendents who attended the university did collegiate work nowhere else.
The so-called "superintendents59 or "principals" In districts not maintaining first
class high schools in 1914-15 were of course primarily high school teachers and might
have been considered in that group. They were, however, more than that. The edu-
cational leadership both of the school and of the community usually devolved upon
them, and from that point of view they deserve special consideration.
As shown in the table already given, the average member of this group has had a
secondary course somewhere, either at high school or normal school, or both, and
a year more of collegiate work which he has usually picked up at various schools in
summer sessions. More than four-fifths of tUe large total of three hundred have at-
tended the normal schools; scarcely ten per cent ever went to the university without
going to the normal schools, tho about half of the second and third class group and
a little less than one-fifth of the unclassified group — a total of one hundred one —
did attend the university for somewhat more than one summer session each. Their
median attendance at normal school came to between two and three years — a large
part of it secondary work to be sure, as fewer than one- third brought four years of
high school training with them.
The work of preparing the heads of lower class districts wras shared more equally by
the normal schools than was the case with the first class superintendents. Maryville
COUNTY SUPERINTENDENTS S79
had not far from the same proportion, — five per cent, — but Cape Girardeau trained
fourteen per cent, Springfield and Kirks ville each took eighteen per cent, while War-
rensburg had nearly twenty-eight per cent of the total number.
The median salary in the first class of superintendents as a whole stood at $1£50;
in the second and third together, $900; and in the unclassified group, $680. Among
those who attended the normal schools, the median was fifty dollars lower in the
first class; it was the same as the general median in the second and third classes, and
likewise in the unclassified group. The highest paid group of superintendents were
the sixteen men in the first class who had attended neither the Missouri normal schools
nor the state university; they received $1500. Those in the first class who attended
the university but not the normal schools received $1375. Long training drew com-
paratively larger salaries in the better positions. Those with eight years or above
received $£00 more than the others in the first class, $100 more in the second and
third, but the same amount in the unclassified group of which they constituted but
a small proportion — nine per cent.
5. County Superintendents
The county superintendent of public schools is the man oil whom the educational
welfare of the smaller communities in the state at large directly depends. In places
of sufficient size to have a superintendent of their own there is usually some sort of
a school " system " into which this executive fits. But in the case of the county super-
intendent this is lacking — he is himself the system; it is especially necessary, there-
fore, that he should be a man of superior ability and training, the right-hand agent
of the state superintendent, who should have administrative control over his qualifi-
cations, appointment, and work.
In Missouri the county superintendency was achieved only after a long struggle
against traditional opposition, and represents a compromise which for three vital
reasons largely destroys the efficiency of the position : The officer is elected by popu-
lar vote, must be a citizen of the county in which he is elected, and may possess
only nominal qualifications for his work. Such executives are probably better than
none, and may occasionally be successful, as certain of the county superintendents in
Missouri, and those not invariably the best trained, clearly prove; but the average of
their performance is admittedly very low, and an inspection of the following general
statement of their training in advance of an elementary education makes the reason
why it is low sufficiently evident.
Less than. Less than Less than Four Five years Six years. Seven years JSiffht wears
two years three years four years years or more or more or -more or more
10% 15% 28% 16% 56% 38% 25% 15%
100%
380 PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
Data were supplied by all of the ninety-five men and nineteen women on duty in the
one hundred fourteen counties of the state. The median number of years of training
above the elementary school for both men and women was five ; more than one-fourth
had less than four years, while one-fourth had more than six years. Eight years of
school work, or the preparation usually required of a good high school teacher, had
been completed by fewer than one-sixth of the total. Yet the state is depending upon
such persons to direct and vitalize intelligently the educational processes to which
its total rural and village school population is subject! Cheerful inadequacy of educa-
tional procedure in a sovereign American democracy could find no more revealing
illustration.
Seventy per cent of the number have at some time attended a normal school,1 but
for brief periods as far as collegiate work is concerned ; one-half of these have done
either secondary work only or less than one year's work beyond secondary require-
ments. Seventeen per cent have attended both the normal schools and the university,
and seven per cent, the university but not the normal schools. Just over one-fourth
hold two-year degrees or better, and fewer than one-tenth have four-year degrees.
Salaries reflect the training to a considerable extent. The median annual salary in
the group of fifty having four years or less of training beyond the elementary school
is $900 as compared with $1£00 in the group of sixty-four having more than four
years of preparation. Those who have attended normal schools and the university
for whatever period receive a median of 81100, as compared with $975, which is the
median for the twenty-six others. The nineteen women receive $1100, and have
slightly better training than the ninety-five men who receive $1000.
The situation as to the professional training of the county superintendents that
has been indicated above is deplorable, and is fully appreciated by the normal
schools and by the university. Efforts have been made at all the schools to inspire and
assist these public servants in discharging heavy responsibilities little appreciated by
the state at large. The betterment of their professional equipment is wholly volun-
tary on their part, however, and under the political arrangement in vogue it cannot
be wondered at if the majority feel that their time is more profitably spent in repair-
ing their "fences" rather than their education. A state that will tolerate such a system
must expect to reap its legitimate fruits in the low vitality and slow progress of its
educational interests at the very point where growth should to-day be most rapid.
C. WHAT HAVE THE NORMAL SCHOOLS DONE FOR THE STATE?
NORMAL SCHOOLS MOST EFFECTIVE IN SMALL COMMUNITIES
In characterizing the achievement of the normal schools as revealed by their pro-
duct in actual service, a few striking facts engage the attention at once. First, with
regard to geographical limitations. The normal schools scarcely touch St. Louis, and
1 Four per cent have enrolled at Maryville. The other schools have each drawn practically one-sixth of the total.
WHAT HAVE NORMAL SCHOOLS DONE? 381
with the development of Kansas City's local training school they will in the future
have even less access there than heretofore. Furthermore, altho a majority of ele-
mentary teachers in the next largest urban centres have at some time attended nor-
mal schools, the financial position of those who have not attended them is much
better than that of those who have. This can be partially accounted for by the fact
that those who have not attended normal schools are older teachers who are drawing
higher salaries. Nevertheless, the relation holds good even age for age from the very
outset, indicating that the situation is one of serious significance which the normal
schools may well take to heart.
Systematic enquiry thru these larger systems showed that while the work of the
normal schools was approved as valuable for broadening teachers when already in
service, yet for practical initial results the superintendents preferred teachers taken
directly from their own high schools, especially if they had teacher- training classes.
Such people knew the ground, and could shortly be trained to fit, while a stranger
from the normal school not only needed an equal amount of special training, but
often brought curious and fixed ideas that must first be modified before she could
succeed. Thus because of the generalized, indefinite preparation which they have em-
phasized, the normal schools never have made their service indispensable to these
larger systems as they might have done. Several of the cities would gladly have es-
tablished their own training schools had they been able to afford it.
In the small cities and in the towns, on the contrary, the normal schools have been
thoroughly at home. Here a paternalized board control, frequent changes in superin-
tendents, and a generally undeveloped educational situation have made the varied
accessions from the normal school assimilable because they were more responsible
than high school graduates who, under the circumstances, could not be well super-
vised. Such a situation in turn has appealed to the normal schools, interested as they
were primarily, not in furnishing teachers technically competent for specific tasks,
but in giving boys and girls a general education thru teaching as a means of sup-
port ad interim.
NORMAL SCHOOL INFLUENCE WIDESPREAD BUT VAGUE
Secondly, in respect to the scope of normal school activity, the situation answers
perfectly the desires and claims of the most catholic normal school enthusiast. Most
frequently as an interlayer, a veneer, or merely as a wash, but rarely as the solely
sufficient institutional preparation for a teacher, normal school experience occurs
plentifully in every grade of the profession in Missouri, In 1915 nearly one-half of the
country school teachers had attended normal schools for six months;1 two-thirds of
the teachers in graded elementary schools had attended the normal schools for one year.
More than half of all teachers in classified high schools, outside of St. Louis and
Kansas City, had attended the normal schools for two years; in first class high schools
1 This and the similar measures of attendance which follow should be understood as the median in each case.
PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
two-fifths of the teachers had such training, and in the second and third class schools,,
the great majority. Two-thirds of the city and town superintendents in first class dis-
tricts,, and four-fifths of the remainder, had attended normal schools — the first for
a period of three years. Of county superintendents, seven-tenths received part or all
of their professional schooling in these institutions. Of course a very large amount
of all this has been secondary work only. Nevertheless, the normal schools have clearly
made themselves part and parcel of the educational fabric of the state, especially in
its smaller centres and rural districts.
But it is the ^.ature of this extraordinary performance that gives it its chief sig-
nificance. When it is remembered that an appreciable part of the work was done
in summer sessions, often after the student had already taken his position; that
classes were generally made up of several kinds of student at once, so that the same
course was obliged to function for a superintendent as "school administration," for
a principal as "school management," and for a teacher as "class management;" when
the amount of brief, irregular attendance is recalled, as well as the almost complete
lack of sequence or coherence in the courses themselves; when all these conditions
are considered, the results before us appear as an indistinguishable blur. Courses deal-
ing distinctly and adequately with the problems of the principal, the superintendent,
or even of the high school teacher could not succeed at the normal schools, to say
nothing of whole curricula for such persons. It was thought necessary, therefore, if
they were accommodated at all, to fall back on general courses, and because this was
thought to be necessary, it became part of the normal school's theory of teacher-
training — such courses for all comers were unifying and democratic, ran the doc-
trine; specific training was either needless or should be obtained only in practice.
The normal schools may claim with much force that this adjustment has suited
the existing conditions ; that with legislation such as it was, there was no alternative
but to offer to fit everybody for everything, since in fact this was about what every-
body did. It has been one of the objects of this report to point out the weakness
of such efforts, and to urge that the normal schools themselves lead the movement to
convince the Missouri, public that its educational problems are real and difficult,
that they require people of special ability and prolonged specific training for their
handling, and that only such persons should be allowed to qualify for the public ser-
vice. Such a policy is the only one that is defensible educationally to-day, and fur-
thermore, it is the only one that will win the confidence of school systems sufficiently
developed to have discriminating requirements.
GOOD TEACHERS IMPOSSIBLE AT THE PRESENT ECONOMIC LEVEL
A final characteristic, not so much of the normal school product as of the condi-
tions vital to the quality of that product, appears in the data already cited, with
force calculated to appall the student of education in a democracy. Teachers and
school officers who 'have studied at the normal schools for any considerable period do
WHAT HAVE NORMAL SCHOOLS DONE?
Indeed appear to receive usually a little more money than those who have not9 but
where it exists, the difference is so minute as only to compel attention rather to the
utter absurdity of the general economic level itself. Rural teachers receive $45 per
month for six or eight months; graded school teachers1 receive annually $4<5Q; high
school teachers,1 $675; superintendents, the educational chief s-of- staff, receive9 in
first class cities, $1250, elsewhere, $900; and county superintendents, the state's
highest educational officials in direct contact with schools, $1075.2
Why take the trouble to point out that one group receives an annual salary of
$500, whereas another receives but $450, when both sums are plainly less than the
increase alone should have been during the recent period of rising prices? Missouri
would have education for its youth — education which is obtainable only from selected
and skilled men and women who themselves possess it as professional capital for
this purpose. Yet to obtain it the state bids an amount that would shame an un-
skilled farm hand or the lowest class of street laborer. The situation would be in-
credible were it not real. This is not an invective based upon a sentimental feeling
for the poverty-stricken teacher; he.is indeed a conscientious and devoted worker,
and on the score of good intentions alone undoubtedly deserves more than he receives.
The really desperate facts in the case are of quite another nature. They have to do
solely with the crying needs of the children for whom teachers are employed. On the
whole, Missouri is getting to-day just what it pays for — a palpably crude, ignorant,
and wasteful performance in elementary and secondary instruction in which its boys
and girls are the constant and final sufferers. It would be foolish to pay much more
for this.
Suppose, on the other hand, that Missouri were to enlarge and utilize in the ele-
mentary and secondary schools, alike in town and country, its present fifteen hun-
dred dollar class in the professional population — the class well represented to-day,
say, by the men and women now teaching in the normal schools and in some of the
smaller colleges. These constitute a well-prepared and carefully selected body of
teachers capable of giving genuine instruction in elementary and secondary schools.
Fifteen thousand of them could be had in a short time if the state chose to triple its
investment in teachers salaries ; and flae resulting educational transformation would
prove immediately to the blindest citizen that what he is now taught to regard as
good public education is but a travesty on what is actually available, and what he
himself could easily, and would gladly, pay for. Why should St. Louis have accom-
plished teachers while a remote county in the Ozarks, with just as capable and deserv-
ing boys and girls to educate, puts up with instruction that is wholly inefficient and
depressing? The state exists to equalize these differences. It can do it, and it ought
to do it.
1 Excluding St. Louis and Kansas City.
s Changes since 1915 have tended to convert these medians into minima without, however, altering the general
situation.
584 PRODUCT OF THE NORMAL SCHOOL
It is obvious, of course, that under these conditions the normal schools have not
provided, and could not provide, the state with good teachers as that terra must
truthfully be interpreted. They have moved steadily and industriously along, reflect-
ing the publics generally low conception of what good teaching meant, but maintain-
ing the personally high character and ideals of their students. If granted by the state
a commission to prepare real teachers of expert attainments and the means where-
with to do it, there is no reason to believe that they would not speedily and success-
fully adjust themselves to that task.
X
LINCOLN INSTITUTE
LINCOLN INSTITUTE, located at Jefferson City, is the state's school for colored teachers.
The manner of its origin is probably unique. The institution was established upon a
slender foundation of $6879 contributed in 1865 by the veterans of the Sixty-second
and Sixty-fifth Regiments of the United States Colored Infantry, that the children
of their race in Missouri might have a useful education. Richard B. Foster (white),
a New Englander educated at Dartmouth and a first lieutenant in the Sixty-second
Regiment, organized and for six years assisted in conducting the school. In 1879 it
was relieved of debt and taken over by the state, which has since provided its support.
The problems of this very appealing little enterprise are of such a special and pe-
culiar nature as to preclude their satisfactory discussion within the limits of the pres-
ent volume. It seems permissible9 however, even without presenting the evidence, to
record briefly the impressions that a careful examination of the institution made upon
those engaged in the enquiry.1
Colored persons constitute less than one- twentieth of Missouri's total population
and tend to diminish in relative numbers. The colored teachers required in the state
are therefore few — less than eight hundred all told in 191 5. 2 Nevertheless, the state
constitution requires that such teachers be educated separately from white teachers.
This being the case, it is manifestly to be expected that the training provided should
bear favorable comparison with that afforded white teachers; much as the admirable
high school advantages for colored youth in St. Louis may be fairly compared with
the opportunities supplied for children of white parents.
This expectation is very far from being realized. The essential character of the
school as at present conducted is epitomized in the catalogue announcement that its
president is professor of " Psychology, Educational Psychology, Rural Pedagogy, So-
ciology and Latin, Modern and Medieval History, Economics, Logic, and Director of
the Training School," and that its students have opportunities for "a college course,
the same as students at the State University at Columbia." Actually, the "college de-
partment," for which an elaborate curriculum is set forth, does not exist ; considered
on its merits, all of the school's work, the normal department included, is on a second-
ary level or below, and has apparently always been so. Curricula could not be discov-
ered, and the training department is a pathetic delusion. It requires something more
than the degree-granting powers lavishly bestowed by the Legislature, and the pre-
tentious claims of a catalogue, to maintain a school.
On the other hand, if properly labeled, much of the instruction, especially in tech-
nical branches, would undoubtedly appear worthy and suited to the needs of the stu-
1 The school was visited in 1916, Changres are known to have taken place since then, notably in the directorship,
but with what effect feas not been ascertained.
2 State Be&ort, 1915, page 230.
386 LINCOLN INSTITUTE
dents. The academic work is of a highly formal character, but the teachers seem in
many cases to be well educated. So far as could be discovered, the students' life at the
school was wholesome and profitable.
The chief weaknesses in the institution appear to arise, first, out of a lack of capa-
ble leadership and, second, out of too little protection from political disturbance.
Competent testimony indicated that an upheaval was expected at least with each
change of the political administration and occasionally oftener. The school is under
the very shadow of the capitol, and owing to its peculiar nature is exposed to spe-
cial manipulation. It would be a great relief to the institution, not to speak of the
educational gain that would surely follow, if it could be placed in charge of a good
state board of education as suggested elsewhere for the normal schools.
It hardly needs to be pointed out that no school can be expected to thrive with-
out adequate leadership and without provision for automatic educational inspection
and stimulation from without. If a competent director for the school cannot be found
among colored candidates, — a contingency that is difficult to believe, — a white man
should certainly be installed. The state as a whole has no interest in providing per-
quisites for the colored race, but it is interested in giving the members of that race
in Missouri access to an appropriate and thorough education of modern type. Even
among the responsible educators of the state the situation as it exists is regarded as
a joke, and it would rightly be so considered were it not so pitiful and so unnecessary.
If the organization of teacher- training agencies elsewhere described * were to be
developed for the university and normal schools, the director of Lincoln Institute
should be included in the professional board having immediate charge of supplying
teachers. In the case of St. Louis, already referred to, the principal of the high school
for colored students meets with the other high school principals in their professional
deliberations and receives the inspiration of their criticism and advice. The same
relation in the case of the schools established to promote the state's interest in good
teachers would be equally desirable and proper.
XI
SUMMARY OF PROPOSALS FOR THE PREPARATION OF
MISSOURI TEACHERS IN NORMAL SCHOOLS
PURPOSE OF THE PROPOSALS
THE chief problem at present confronting the State of Missouri, like that in most
other states, is how best, with state funds and thru state control, to ensure adequate
education for all of its youth throughout the twelve-year period terminating in gen-
eral when the pupil becomes eighteen years of age. Adequate education is primarily
a matter of competent teachers, and the provision of competent teachers is a single
clearly defined task outranking in importance all other state obligations save only
the maintenance of social order and the protection of the public health, and is supe-
rior even to these except in the sense that without them it could not be achieved.
To provide itself with teachers, the State of Missouri has availed itself of various
agencies originating in different ways and hitherto pursuing an independent devel-
opment. In their earlier stages these uncoordinated instrumentalities wrought well
on the whole; their utmost labors have successfully reduced a colossal need. Of late,
however, the clearer definition of their task has shown them to be acting upon mutu-
ally conflicting and wasteful policies.
A sound and progressive development of the function of teacher preparation in the
future requires that it be conceived and administered consistently as one problem,
that all of its phases be related to a single fully informed and competent executive
authority; and that it be supervised by a representative body responsive to the will
of the state and capable of interpreting its desires.
Altho the provision of properly selected and instructed teachers is much the weight-
iest item in a staters educational program, it is in itself but a part of the total edu-
cational problem. Rearrangements intended to furnish a sufficient supply of good
teachers may therefore involve a readjustment of the entire educational administra-
tion with a view to securing an efficient scheme of organization.
With needs such as these in view, the Missouri institutions chiefly concerned have
already embarked upon a plan of voluntary cooperation which has effected many
important improvements and promises many more. Pending fundamental readjust-
ments, this movement should be allowed opportunity to mature.
It has been the purpose of this study, however, to reach as nearly as possible the
root of existing weaknesses, and to suggest changes likely to correct them not only
in Missouri but wherever they may be found. To this end, therefore, and not solely
with the idea of formulating a possible program for Missouri, the proposals here sum-
marized are offered. They group themselves naturally in two divisions: A. Conclusions
and proposals having to do with the external organization and control of normal
schools; and B. Conclusions and proposals relating to the internal organization and
388 SUMMARY OF CONCLUSIONS
procedure best suited to the preparation of teachers in state institutions of the nor-
mal school type.
A. CONCLUSIONS AND PEOPOSALS DELATING TO EXTERNAL ORGANIZATION AND CONTROL
1. Constitutional Modifications1 (see Chapter IV, C, page 63)
a. The constitution should provide for a State Board of Education consisting of
five members serving without pay, said board to be further determined and
established by law. To this board the constitution should delegate full powers
of government, control, and, thru its appointed officers, of administration of
all educational institutions or departments of whatever nature for which state
moneys or legislative appropriations are expended, together with the custo-
dianship, regulation, and distribution of all state funds existing for educa-
tional purposes. It should be the further constitutional duty of said board to
exercise general supervision over the entire educational system of the state; to
see to the execution and enforcement throughout the state of all laws relating
to education; to learn by competent inspection and to report to the legislature
at each regular session concerning the conditions, progress, and needs of the
people of the state in respect to education; and from time to time to frame for
enactment into law proposals that shall meet the educational requirements as
reported. Finally, it should be the constitutional duty of the board to serve
as the agent of the state in all dealings with the federal government in which
educational considerations or appropriations for education of any sort are
involved.
b. The present ex-officio Board of Education and the existing office of State Su-
perintendent of Public Schools, together with all other provisions inconsistent
with the above proposals, should be omitted from the constitution.
%. Legislative Provisions (see Chapter IV, B and C, pages 54 and 63)
a. In accordance with the suggested amendments to the constitution there should
be created a Board of Education of the character and for the purposes therein
stated. The members of this board should be representative citizens not pro-
fessionally engaged in education or interested directly in any educational
institution; they should not be incumbents of any position in the pay of the
state or otherwise a public trust; they should be elected at large or appointed
by the governor, one member every two years for a term of ten years. The spe-
cific duties of this board should be as follows :
(1) To appoint an executive officer to be known as the Chancellor of the Uni-
versity, thru whom alone the board should control and administer the vari-
ous institutions of the state constituting the university.
(2) To appoint, coordinate with the foregoing, an executive officer to be known
as Commissioner of Elementary and Secondary Education, thru whom
alone its oversight of elementary and secondary education should be con-
ducted.
1 Changes in the Missouri constitution are not indispensable to a successful organization of the agencies for prepar-
ing- teachers. The normal schools may be incorporated with the state university by legal enactment, and the func-
tions of a Board of Education may be discharged, so far as institutions are concerned, by the present Board of Cura-
tors. In that case the Superintendent of Public Schools would continue to be an elective officer, but should be a
member of the proposed council of presidents.
EXTERNAL ORGANIZATION 389
(3) To fix the salaries of Its chief executives, and in event of the unsatisfactory
performance of their duties, or of their failure to cooperate., to remove
them.
(4) To appoint upon nomination thru its chief executives respectively (in
the Division of Education, on the original initiative of the divisional board
of presidents), and upon their motion to remove, all officers, professors,
instructors^deputies, inspectors, examiners, and other assistants necessary
to the effective performance of the duties of the board and to the successful
conduct of the institutions under their control, and to fix their salaries.
(5) To arrive at its conclusions in all matters only after advising with its chief
executives, who for this purpose shall be ex-officns non-voting members of
the board, and to give validity by its sanction to their approved proposals,
(6) Thru its executive, the Chancellor of the University, to exercise complete
oversight and control over all state-supported institutions in so far as they
are engaged in any form of higher or adult education; in schools aided
by the state, to exercise such oversight as may be necessary to safeguard
the conditions upon which aid is granted.
(7) Thru its executive, the Commissioner of Elementary and Secondary Edu-
cation, to exercise a general supervision over the public school system
of the state; to attend to the enforcement of all laws pertaining to public
schools or to education in this field ; to regulate completely the distribu-
tion of school funds; to classify schools; to establish uniform records and
reports; to determine the qualifications of teachers, the amount and gen-
eral character of their training, their certification for elementary, second-
ary, and special schools, and the recognition of certificates and diplomas
from other states; to establish in cooperation with the State Board of
Health standards for the construction, arrangement, and sanitary equip-
ment of school buildings and school sites, and to direct the medical inspec-
tion and study of public health in so far as schools are concerned.
(8) Thru its executives, jointly:
(a) To provide the necessary agencies both for the initial training of teach-
ers and for their professional advancement in service, and to super-
vise their operation.
(&) To consider the interests and welfare of the whole body of teachers in
the state and, if found desirable, to undertake the establishment of a
retirement or pension fund for their benefit.
(c) To study the educational needs of the state and to take steps to pro-
vide adequate facilities for such training as may be considered advan-
tageous.
(d) To give state- wide publicity to accurate and comprehensive informa-
tion regarding the available educational facilities both within and
without the state.
(<?) To prepare and submit to each legislature a budget of expenditures
for educational purposes during the ensuing biennium,
(f) To make an annual report to the governor of its acts, together with an
390 SUMMARY OF CONCLUSIONS
itemized account of expenditures of all state funds and appropriations
for education.
&. To make the foregoing provision effective, there should be transferred to the
State Board of Education thus created , all the powers and duties of the pres-
ent Board of Education and State Superintendent of Public Schools., of the
Board of Curators of the university, of each of the six Boards of Regents of
the state normal schools and of Lincoln Institute, of the boards now in charge
of the state institutions for the blind, for the deaf and dumb, and of all other
state-supported institutions in so far as the education of attendants or inmates
is concerned.
c. All laws inconsistent with the intent of the above recommended legislation
should be repealed.
3. Administrative Policies of the Board (see Chapter IV, B, page 54)
a. In view of the organization provided for above, all state-supported agencies
for the preparation of teachers should become component units in the state's
establishment for higher education — the university; their several directors
should continue to function as presidents of their respective institutions.
Even without the larger changes involving constitutional alteration, the in-
corporation of the normal schools as colleges within the organization of the
state university would make possible most of the changes deemed desirable
in this study.
§. Such coordination accomplished, steps should be taken at once for bringing
the whole problem of the preparation and supply of teachers under compe-
tent and unremitting study with a view to maintaining the various agencies
at hand in constant adjustment to the needs of the state. For this purpose
the several heads of institutions, together with the dean of the school of
education at the university, should be constituted a permanent council of en-
quiry and administration for the preparation and supply of teachers. As au-
thorized experts in that field it should be their business, in frequent sessions
and subject to the approval of the Chancellor and Board of Education —
(1) To determine accurately, with the advice and assistance of the Commis-
sioner of Elementary and Secondary Education, the number and char-
acter of the teachers needed to supply satisfactorily the public schools of
Missouri, and to formulate proposals for the provision or adaptation of
facilities to meet this need.
(2) To determine, with the cooperation and approval of their respective facul-
ties, the nature and organization of the various curricula and courses
necessary to furnish the kind and number of teachers desired; to assign
the various types of work to different schools with a view to utilizing the
available facilities to the best possible advantage.
(3) To agree upon all regulations and administrative procedure governing the
different colleges and schools of education, and to provide for the effec-
tive execution of their conclusions; to determine the personnel of instruc-
tion and administration in the same, as well as successors to their own
membership.
INTERNAL ORGANIZATION S91
(4) To prepare and submit to the Chancellor biennially a budget of expend-
itures for the preparation of teachers during the ensuing biennium.
c. Of the organization just described the Chancellor of the University and the
Commissioner of Elementary and Secondary Education would properly be
members ex-qfficiis. The first would seek to maintain appropriate relations
between the different forms of professional education — law, medicine, agri-
culture and so forth, and teaching; while the latter, as the responsible head
of the service into which teachers go, would naturally be vitally concerned in
their adequate preparation.
B. CONCLUSIONS AND PROPOSALS RELATING TO INTERNAL ORGANIZATION AND
PROCEDURE
1. Purpose and Scope of Normal School Effort (see Chapter V, page 70)
a. It should be considered as a fundamental principle that state-supported
agencies for preparing teachers should devote themselves exclusively and with-
out reserve to that task.
5. The scope of the activities of any state-supported institution for preparing
teachers should be determined invariably by a permanent authority repre-
senting all such undertakings within the state. The harmonious- interrela-
tionship of all teacher-preparing agencies in accordance with a careful and
exhaustive canvass of the existing needs is the only proper guide in deter-
mining what kind of teachers any given school or department shall undertake
to prepare.
2. The Curricula
a. Outstanding Problems of Curriculum Construction (see Chapter VII, A, page
188)
(1) The minimum standard of admission to all professional teaching curric-
ula should be the requirement of graduation from an approved four-year
secondary school, or its equivalent by examination; this standard should
be fixed at once. Service as teacher in a public school without recognized
professional training of collegiate character should be made impossible.
(2) A schedule of progressive increase in residence requirements should be
established. The expressed goal of this program should be, in effect, an
identical residence requirement for all public school teachers from the first
to the twelfth grades, urban and rural alike, — a requirement of four school
years of organized professional preparation of collegiate character.
(8) In order to make possible a standard admission and residence require-
ment for professional curricula in the case of women, the profession of
teaching should be made attractive to them throughout the state as a per-
manent life career. Their marriage should not be considered as a bar to
such service, but rather as an added qualification.
(4) After a brief period of orientation and self-discovery on common ground,
£ SUMMARY OF CONCLUSIONS
all professional curricula should, in the interests of the public service, have
in view definitely distinguished positions, to the preparation for which
their entire resources may contribute. In so far as formulated disciplines
exist that clearly promote skill and power in the given position, the prin-
ciple of free or group election should give place to prescriptive sequences
prepared by experienced observers. In the longer curricula, where reasoned
equivalence may be secured, or is a matter of indifference, option may be
allowed, but the greatest possible effectiveness of the teacher in the posi-
tion chosen should be the first consideration throughout.
(5) The differentiation of curricula according to the position in view, a prin-
ciple already partly recognized for primary and high school teachers,
should be completely worked out, and should be applied as well to the
middle and upper grades, and to the work of school administration.
6. Organization of Secondary Curricula for the Professional Preparation of
Teachers (see Chapter VII, B, pages 164-166, 173-177)
(1) As long as it is necessary to offer professional preparation for teaching to
candidates of secondary grade, the professional courses should be concen-
trated in the fourth year, which should be completely devoted to them.
(2) The principal emphasis in this year of professional study should be upon
the subject-matter which the students are preparing to teach and upon
participation in the actual work of elementary teaching. The asubject-
matter " courses should include industrial arts, music, drawing, and ele-
mentary agriculture or agricultural nature study. The participation in
teaching should extend throughout the year. It should involve carefully
graded exercises in individual and group instruction in the schools of the
community in which the training-class is located, and should include
a period of not less than two weeks responsible teaching in a one-room
school.
(3) In addition to the work in subject-matter and in teaching, the student
should have a course in elementary pedagogy including the simpler prin-
ciples of educational psychology, a course in rural school management,
and a course in rural life problems.
(4) As soon as possible, the work of this fourth year should be transferred
to the first collegiate year at a normal school., and thereafter expanded
into longer curricula of two, three, and ultimately of four years for the
professional preparation of rural school teachers.
c. Organization of Collegiate Curricula for the Professional Preparation of
Teachers (see Chapter VII, B,page 161)
(1) Curricula of collegiate grade that have for their purpose the preparation
of teachers should be professionalized throughout in the sense that every
course should be chosen with specific reference to the contribution that
it makes to the teacher's equipment. This would, by definition, include
courses of a distinctly "liberal" type (pages 166-1 72, 228-24(7).
(2) The focal characteristic of every such curriculum should be participation
in the actual work of teaching; consequently the training school should
INTERNAL ORGANIZATION 393
be looked upon and administered as the central feature of the normal
school organization (pages 19S, 224).
(3) No professional curriculum for teachers should look exclusively toward
the development of specific skill in teaching. It should aim as well to make
the teacher professionally intelligent: competent to cooperate in the con-
struction of large educational plans and policies, or at least to measure
the full significance of constructive proposals. This broader aim of ensur-
ing professional intelligence will naturally receive greater emphasis in the
longer curricula, but it should find a definite expression even in the brief-
est preparation (pages 179—182).
(4) The so-called "professional" courses — psychology, the history of edu-
cation, principles of teaching, school management, practice teaching, and
the like — should be judged not only by the extent to which they increase
specific skill in classroom procedure, but also by their contribution to the
broader professional intelligence and insight of the teacher. In connection
with the latter aim, the claims of biology, sociology, and economics should
be considered as well as those of the professional courses now recognized
as such (pages 179-18$).
(5) The sequence of professional work should represent a progression from
the concrete courses that deal primarily with classroom procedure to the
more abstract summarizing and systematic courses. The latter conse-
quently will appear at or near the end, and will be elaborated most fully in
the longer curricula (pages 183, 186, 189, 191, 224).
(6) A general course in "pure" psychology is of doubtful value as an intro-
duction to professional study. The introductory course should deal rather
with the concrete applications of psychology to teaching (educational
psychology), leaving the more abstract course in psychology until later.
All courses should exemplify and expressly emphasize the psychological
principles which they involve (pages 182, 183).
(7) A general course in the history of education is probably out of place in
one-year or two-year curricula. Such a course, however, should serve an
important purpose in one of the later years of the longer curricula. Most
courses would gain both in force and coherence by briefly tracing the
development in their own practice. These partial glimpses should then be
gathered firmly into a complete picture by a systematic course in educa-
tional development as a whole (pages 184-187).
(8) The courses generally known as principles of teaching (general method)
and school management will yield the best results if associated closely
with the work in participation and practice teaching (pages 189, 191).
(9) As far as possible, the distinction between courses in "special methods of
teaching" and courses in the subject-matter itself should be eliminated.
Every professional curriculum should embody thorough courses of dis-
tinctly collegiate character in all of the subject-matter that the student
proposes to teach. In these courses the specific organization of materials
for elementary or secondary teaching should be fully discussed, and the
approved methods of teaching should be both exemplified and justified.
394 SUMMARY OF CONCLUSIONS
All teachers of the so-called academic subjects should hold a direct and
responsible relationship to the training school (pages 199— 202, 227).
(10) In each specific curriculum, a course that aims to organize and integrate
the work of that field for which the curriculum prepares (primary teach-
ing, intermediate grade teaching, junior high school teaching, and so
forth) should be offered in the final year (pages 224, 227).
(11) The importance of the training school in the scheme of curriculum con-
struction above outlined suggests —
(a) Much more extensive training-school facilities than most normal schools
now provide; intimate and to some extent controlling relations should
be developed with the local public school system (pages 192-197).
(6) Control by the normal school of the principal school or schools in
which students serve as teachers for practice. This should not preclude
a supplementary use of other schools for apprentice- teaching (page 193).
(c) A recognition of the status of the supervisor and critic teacher as equal
or superior to that of the "academic" teacher (page 213).
(d) The unification of the headship of the education department with the
direction of the training school and of practice teaching in one person.
(<?) The safeguarding of the interests of training-school pupils by permit-
ting not more than three-fourths and preferably not more than one-
half of the teaching to be done by student-teachers (page 194).
(f) The provision of a separate school for experimental purposes, and the
limitation of the training school to practice teaching and teaching for
purposes of demonstration (page 221).
(g) The employment of teachers of educational theory and teachers of
"academic" subjects as supervisors of teaching under the general con-
trol of the director of training (page 202).
(K) A systematic gradation of the work in observation, participation,
group-teaching, and responsible room-teaching (pages 224, 225).
(12) In each collegiate curriculum of two years or more, a term or a semester
should be left after the period of responsible room-teaching, for the sum-
marizing courses mentioned above (pages 183, 224).
(13) Each prescribed professional curriculum should have in view the sym-
metrical development of an individual's knowledge and skill as required
for an analyzed purpose. It is not a mere series of independent courses
juxtaposed by title. It is rather one complex, carefully devised tool
operated by different instructors to a common end. Its success depends
upon the extent to which these instructors, by constant study, confer-
ence, and mutual criticism, learn to reenforce arid supplement each other
in the content of their teaching. Differences should be worked out in
advance or omitted. Each curriculum should constitute a harmoniously
interrelated body of instruction progressively directed toward a definite
result that is clearly, understood by all.
d* Quality of Normal School Instruction as a Factor in the Curriculum :
INTERNAL ORGANIZATION 395
(1 ) The actual teaching by normal school instructors should be looked upon
as an essential part of the professional curricula (page £47).
(2) For exemplary effect, every effort should be made to ensure the conditions
that will result in superior teaching upon the part of normal school in-
structors (pages 249-255).
(a) Provision for the study and criticism of class instruction in the normal
schools should be devised and put into operation. This would probably
be best accomplished by a special adviser serving his fellow instructors in
the relation of a colleague, or thru a changing committee of leading in-
structors (pages £55-257).
e. Selection and Distribution of Curricula (pages 258-265).
(1) The present administration of the curricula in the Missouri normal schools
is wasteful and ineffective, due to duplication of classes, to an extravagant
elective system, and to the complete lack of the intercollegiate differen-
tiation of specialized curricula. Differentiation and concentration of pre-
scribed curricula in accordance with the previously ascertained needs of
the state are suitable remedies for the existing situation.
3. Staff of Instruction (see Chapter VI, A, page 99; Chapter VIII, A, page 272)
a. The Presidents (pages 273-276).
(1) The normal school is weakened by the excessive prerogative now vested in
its president. Such powers as are now exercised by him should be shared
partly with a strengthened faculty, partly with other presidents in coop-
erative direction of all the teacher-training agencies of the state.
b. The Teachers (pages 99-116, 276-292).
(1) Normal school instructors should be transformed into a true "faculty"
by classifying them according to merit and service, and by allowing them
the exercise of influence characteristic of faculties in good higher institu-
tions in determining the educational policy of the school. They should be
absolutely relieved of clerical and administrative duties (page 276).
(2) Their training should conform to collegiate standards, and as these are
approximated, their formal hours of class work should be correspondingly
diminished and concentrated, their salaries should be much increased, and
their tenure of position should be made permanent (pages 105, 110, 114,
280).
(3) Excellence of general education and of professional training and experi-
ence should be particularly required of instructors in education, of super-
visors of practice teaching, and of critic teachers; these should be the
dominant personal elements in any normal school faculty (page 288).
(4) For the sake of teachers in service the summer session should be well
staffed with competent and experienced instructors. They should be as
well paid as teachers in the regular session. Student assistants are not
desirable as instructors in professional institutions for the preparation of
teachers (pages 286-292).
396 SUMMARY OF CONCLUSIONS
4. The Student Body (see Chapter VI, B, page 117; Chapter VIII, B5 page 292).
a. The conscious effort to attract or to retain men students in normal schools
at a sacrifice of a clear aim and of an intensive organization of work is not
in the best interests of the service (pages 292-295).
b. The secondary instruction offered in the normal schools should be abandoned;
young pupils should be returned to the high schools for preparation, and
state-supported high schools, with organization wholly separate from that of
the normal schools, should be provided for older, belated students (page 295).
c. Concessions to irregular attendants have seriously hampered the proper work
of the schools and should not continue. Cooperation among the schools in the
adoption of prescribed curricula requiring continuous attendance would prove
greatly to the advantage both of the student and of the service (page 305).
d. Admission to the normal schools should depend on either a credential issued
by the state authority for the inspection and approval of secondary schools,
or an adequate examination (page 312).
e. The tendency to excessive student programs would be most effectually reme-
died by resorting to fixed curricula based, not on the number of hours or points,
but on the successful completion of a certain series of courses taken in a defi-
nite combination and sequence (pages 317-320).
f. Fully to serve its purpose, the normal school should seek to become a selective
institution. In determining the degrees of student attainment the relaxation
or abandonment of thorough examination without the development of other
more accurate and effective methods of measurement is a mistake. " Sizing
up" on the part of the instructor can scarcely be considered satisfactory
(page 826).
g. The maintenance of accurate, significant records of student work is essential
for the moral health of the institution. The administration of credit should be
in the hands of disinterested officers acting in accordance with regulations and
policies established either by faculty action, or preferably by the joint action
of all responsible authorities of teacher- training institutions (page 342).
k. (1) Graduation should mark the natural terminus in a symmetrically organ-
ized course of training, rather than the achievement of a given number of
unrelated credits (page 344).
(2) Certification should be a matter not of statute but of carefully planned
administration on the part of the state commissioner of education in coop-
eration with the training institutions. It should depend not only on initial
study and examination, but also on competent scrutiny of ability and
growth in service (pages 346-348).
(3) Appointments to positions should involve aclearer and more specific know-
ledge and record both of the candidate and of the proposed position than
are at present attempted. To accomplish this the normal school should
undertake to establish more intimate and responsible relations with its
dependent schools than now exist. The institution's obligations are not
fully discharged until a properly prepared teacher is successfully at work.
INTERNAL ORGANIZATION 397
i. The administrative practices of an institution, like the patterns of instruc-
tion set by its staff, are as vital elements in curricula as are any formal courses;
they should be models of good judgment and skilful planning because of their
inevitable and powerful influence upon the ideals of prospective teachers (pages
353, 354).
APPENDIX
§ I. COLLECTION AND TREATMENT OF DATA
IS specific evidence on which, the conclusions recorded in the foregoing pages are
based has usually been described briefly when cited. For purposes of convenient refer-
ence in considering the tables that follow, a general account of these sources, both
those of a statistical nature and others of a personal character, is given here.
A. THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
1. Each permanent teacher in a normal school or city training school was asked to
fill out a comprehensive questionnaire covering, besides certain personal facts, a large
number of significant iteins in his training, experience, and present service. With few
exceptions all teachers regularly connected with these institutions in the spring of
1915 returned replies.1 See pages 419 fF.
£. Special instructors engaged only for the summer of 1916 were studied, as a sepa-
rate group. For these the essential facts were furnished, not by the individuals them-
selves, but by the school authorities. Eighty-one special teachers were thus reported
upon ; the data regarding thirteen others could not be secured. See pages 426, 4S27.
3. Normal school teachers made a further contribution of exceptional value. After
the preliminary field work of the study had been finished, and the main problems
involved had become clearly defined, a folder was prepared with a view to eliciting
the judgment of the teachers on these questions. Participation in this symposium,
altho wholly voluntary, was very general, and the answers received were highly illu-
minating.
Similarly sheets were issued giving opportunity for a full analysis and description
of each course taught by the teacher. Like the folders just described, the filling of
these course sheets involved much painstaking labor on the part of the instructor.
Nevertheless, they were returned in such numbers and with such careful detail as to
provide an unquestionably reliable description not only of the present procedure but
of the needs and difficulties with which the representative normal school teacher in
Missouri is at present confronted. In all one hundred eleven teachers, or well over half
of the total number, supplied these critical comments, and provided detailed analyses
of about four hundred separate courses. The names of the teachers who rendered this
important service to the study are as follows:
KIHKSVIIXE
J. L. Biggerstaff Johannes Goetze Genevieve Kirkbride
W. J. Bray T. Jennie Green Florence M. Lane
Mark Burroug-hs Edna Hays Grace Lyle
W. A. Clark J. M. Heyd Ralph Noyer
Byron Cosby Harriet Howard Lena Patterson
Laurie Doolittle C. B. Jaccard Eudora Helen Savage
Blanche F. Emery G.H.Jamison A. P. Settle
Clarice Evans Ida A. Jewett C. M. Wise
Eugene Fair Warren Jones William H. Zeigel
D. K. Gebhart
W AB.B.EXS BTJK.G
C E Ayres V. C. Coulter Noble Lee Garrison
Lucy Austin Ball H. G. Ellis Annie G. Harris
Myrtel Casebolt R- A. Gantz M. B. Harwood
1 Kirksville, Springiield, and Harris Teachers College were fully complete ; at Maryvilleone Instructor in music, at
Cape Girardeau one instructor in agriculture and two in music, and at Warrensburg: two assistants in physical edu-
cation, one in mathematics, one intermediate grade supervisor, and the former president failed to reply.
APPENDIX
Clara Hinsdell
M. L. James
Mary A. Kennedy
Lura L. Lemmon
Seth Babcock
L. E. Brucher
Walter F. Cobb
Fred H. Doeden
R. S. Douglas
J. A. Dunn
Mrs. Elma Ealy
E. A. Hay den
B. F. Johnson
Sadie T. Kent
Virginia J. Craig
Mary Davis
Elizabeth Faulkner
C. B. Gentry
Clyde Hill
Estelle Hinton
Christiana Hyatt
Theo. W. H. Irion
Beulah Branner
T. H. Cook
S. E. Davis
Genevieve Apgar
J. Andrew Drushel
WARREN-SB URG (continued)
C. F. Martin
W. W. Parker
C. A. Phillips
B. A. Pratt
CAPE GIRARDEAU
Ida M. Knepper
Myrtle Knepper
Charles Lamb
J. C. Logan
A. C. Magill
H. Marston
W. W. Martin
H. S. Moore
Minnie M. Newman
Jeptha Riggs
SPRINGFIELD
D. T. Kizer
Adah Lewis
C. E. Marston
Louise Nixon
M.A. CTRear
W. J. Osburn
Sue S. Perkins
S. J. Phelps
MARYVILLE
C. A. Hawkins
H. A. Miller
Mildred Miller
HARRIS TEACHERS COLLEGE
Charles M. Gill
E. George Payne
H. Pryor
Mabel M. Richards
William Solomon
A. D. Schuessler
Frances A. Shambaugh
Martha Shea
Ida M. Shilling
J. M. Sitze
Afton Smith
A. W. Vaughan
Emily Wilburn
Natalie Wilson
Remain e Roach
James W. Shannon
Blanche Skinner
A. P. Temple
Lewis F. Thomas
F. F. Thompson
T. J. Walker
Mary A. Woods
George Palfreyman
F. P. Wagg
M. W. Wilson
Laura J. Soper
On still another blank the teachers listed their literary productions, such as books,
pamphlets, magazine and newspaper articles, and so forth.
Much helpful information was procured from the presidents of the institutions.
The authors are especially indebted to President W. S. Dearmont, of Cape Girardeau,
for the contribution of a thoughtful and suggestive review of the whole situation.
4. The student body as a whole was studied on the basis of the complete enrol-
ment at each school during the full year previous to the beginning of the enquiry,
that is, during the school year 1913-14. All the information available at each school
concerning this mass of over seven thousand students was carefully brought together
and tabulated. As a result, the main facts of parentage and paternal occupation,
geographical distribution, previous schooling and teaching experience, dates and
duration of local attendance, character and weight of program, amount and nature of
credit earned, together with manifold incidental items of interest came clearly to view.
Owing to the homogeneous character of the student body at Harris Teachers College,
this analysis was omitted there. See pages 4$8, 4£9.
5. The schools' records of their former students were in most cases very meagre.
It was consequently necessary to supplement these by applying directly to the stu-
dents in attendance at the time when the schools were visited in the spring, summer,
and fall of 1915. In this way information as to nationality, father's income, size and
education of family, early schooling, vocational motive and intention, self-help, judg-
COLLECTION AND TREATMENT OF DATA 408
ments as to effectiveness of normal school training, and some other important phases
of student life was secured. Altho this enquiry did not reach the total enrolment at
any school, even for the term for which it was taken, it supplied the facts for between
two and three thousand representative students, and appeared to offer a secure basis
for generalization. The proportions of the current attendance at the various schools
that furnished usable replies to the questions asked were as follows : Kirksville, 70 per
cent (558); Warrensburg, 94 per cent (626); Cape Girardeau, 83 per cent (539);
Springfield, 56 per cent (471); and Maryville, 90 per cent (259); all schools, 76 per
cent (men, 785 ; women, 1668; total, 2453). See pages 4£9ff.
It was not at first intended to put these questions at Harris Teachers College;
cards were finally distributed, however, at a single gathering of students. Without
further following-up, replies were thus secured from seventy-one per cent (109) of
the total attendance.
The progress of this analysis of the student body from point to point revealed
fresh possibilities; hence certain tables, as indicated thereon, actually apply to only
part of the institutions, altho they are probably representative of all.
6. Study of the administrative procedure within the institutions was facilitated by
a record of the class work of one fii-il year — 1915-16 — procured from each school.
On a separate sheet there was recorded for each individual who gave any form of in-
struction during the year, the name and date of each term -course^ taught, its location
in the curriculum, its value in hours and credit, the student ratings reported in it,
and the monthly and annual salary of the teacher giving it. With trivial exceptions,
every item of instruction during the year in question was thus reported either by the
registrars or by competent clerks approved by the school authorities. See pages 423-
425, 436.
7. The composition of classes was examined by means of a special blank laid be-
fore the members of representative classes in each department. This blank brought
together such facts concerning age, previous training, experience, and teaching pur-
pose, as would be important in the proper classification of students. All told, some
three hundred twenty-five representative classes, distributed among the various
schools, were thus analyzed,
8. The student ratings in all classes for the entire school year, 1913-14, were as-
sembled and studied with a view to determining the extent to which the schools
exercised a selective function among their students. This material permitted like-
wise a comparison of the different departments and schools with a similar purpose.
See page 435.
The collegiate ratings of students prepared largely at the normal schools were
compared with those of students coming from high schools in order to ascertain which
type of student proved most successful in normal school studies. The records of some
four hundred students were examined with the results indicated on page 1£2.
9. To supplement the findings as to current procedure in the schools, it proved
desirable to trace the records of some random group of students throughout their
school careers. For this purpose the school histories of the most recent groups of
graduates were worked out completely on a form showing the -development, duration,
and sequence of their curricula. Here appeared likewise the credit allowed for pre-
paratory credentials, for advanced standing earned at other higher institutions, and
special allowances made on various other considerations. All of these items were either
compiled or checked up from the original entries, where these still existed, and the
longer records that seemed to possess special significance were referred to the students
404 APPENDIX
concerned for verification and comment. In all, four hundred fifty-eight student
records from the five schools were worked out In this manner and given careful study.
The standardized curricula and procedure at Harris Teachers College made such in-
vestigation there unnecessary. See pages 411 ff.
10. Light was sought on the quality of students attending the normal schools thru
enquiries addressed to principals of high schools from which they came. One hundred
eighty officers in as many different high schools responded by rating their graduates
both in studies and in personal qualities, indicating therewith the subsequent occu-
pation of the student, whether at work in college, normal school, business, or teach-
ing, or unemployed. See pages 121, 1SS.
11. In the study of the curriculum an effort was made to ascertain from teachers
in service the features of their training that appeared to them, in the light of sub-
sequent experience, to have been of the greatest practical benefit. This line of enquiry
was not developed as fully as would probably have been justified by the results. Re-
plies were secured from one hundred sixty-three teachers — graduates of the schools
under examination. See page 442.
12. Owing to the central importance of the trailing department in a normal school,
it was felt that any study that omitted a careful application of the best known tests
of school achievement to these institutions would partially fail of its purpose. Accord-
ingly Professor Dearborn of Harvard University with five trained assistants visited
the schools in May, July, and October of 1916, and gave a series of such tests as have
proved most reliable. Because of the small size of some of these departments and their
constituent classes, the results were not always completely satisfactory; they were,
however, the best that could be procured under the circumstances. See pages 443 ff.
13. Altho no pains were spared to guide and verify conclusions by means of the
statistical evidence described above, the study placed far greater dependence upon the
personal contact of its staff with the schools themselves and with the conditions sur-
rounding their work. The director of the enquiry was in the state with his assistants
on seven different occasions for a total of nearly nine months, and Dr. Bagley, who
studied chiefly the curricula and the teaching, was there for two months. Drs. Mc-
Murry and Strayer supplemented earlier familiarity with the field by fresh visits
lasting together several weeks. The procedure was wholly informal; it involved visits
and careful notes in many classes ; countless interviews at free hours with teachers and
officers both alone and in groups, as well as frequent conversations with students,
alumni, and board members not only at the school but in their home towns. The prob-
lems confronting the normal schools in their several districts were studied by visits
to the remoter portions of the state, as well as by prolonged interviews with county
superintendents, occasionally supplemented by a visit with them to the schools under
their supervision. The superintendents of the twenty-five largest towns and cities in
the state were similarly interviewed in person, and the problem of teacher-training
and supply was discussed from their varying points of view.
TREATMENT OF DATA
The statistical material gathered from the normal schools alone constituted a bulk
of over fifteen thousand separate blanks and questionnaires, many of them of consid-
erable length and of a complex character not adapted to tabulating machines. Plain
transcription of data and occasionally simple reckoning was done at the schools by
competent students recommended by the school authorities for the purpose, under the
supervision of a specially trained assistant from the Foundation. Data showing the
COLLECTION AND TREATMENT OF DATA 405
composition of classes were worked up in the department of Education at the Uni-
versity of Illinois, and the judgments of teachers on the comparative value of their
training courses were analyzed at Teachers Colleges New York. Otherwise the mate-
rial was handled at the offices of the Foundation. A force of assistants first went rapidly
thru the entire mass of replies; results that for any reason appeared to have no value
or to be untrustworthy were then discarded, and the remainder were finally revised
and checkedj often repeatedly, with the utmost care. Wherever applicable these data
have supplied the basis for the statements made in the text, and a small portion of
them appear in the following pages.
While the Appendix was in preparation the body of the report was submitted as a
whole in confidential form to the heads of each of the institutions concerned, and also
to the president of the state university, with a request for criticisms or corrections in
statements of fact. Corrections of this nature that proved to be well founded have
been incorporated in the text.
B. THE TEACHING POPULATION
The census of the teaching population of Missouri was undertaken as a special
enterprise to be related as a whole to the complete exposition of the state's agencies
for preparing teachers. In the present treatment of the five state normal schools and
a city training school, it has only a partial, albeit an exceedingly important, signi-
ficance. Comprehensive blanks, with differences appropriate to the various classes of
workers, were issued to all of the teachers and school officers in the state. To these
requests for information approximately eighty-three per cent of the more than nine-
teen thousand teachers and school officers in the state in 1915 replied. In the several
classes of teachers the returns were as follows: %eporiing Proportion
Teachers in rural schools and of more than three grades elsewhere 10,515 8,277 79
Teachers In graded elementary schools outside of St. Louis and Kansas City 3,650 2,993 82
Teachers in elementary schools in St. Louis 1,789 1,560 87
Teachers in elementary schools in Kansas City 779 737 95
Elementary school principals, St. Louis 92 77 84
Elementary school principals, Kansas City 61 51 84
Teachers in classified high schools outside of St. Louis and Kansas City 1,164 1,074 92
Teachers in high schools in St. Louis 343 S29 96
Teachers in high schools in Kansas City 245 239 98
City and town superintendents 5S8 ^ ^
County superintendents _ !!f ........... 1I4 12§
Total 19*290 16>895 83
By the use of these data it has been possible to work out an approximately accu-
rate estimate of the number of new teachers required in a given year, and to deter-
mine their source, age, and training. Furthermore, the present contribution of each
school to the preparation of teachers for the state, both in kind and number, appears
clearly. These facts are accurate for a single year only, but with such numbers they
are undoubtedly representative of the general situation, and are sufficiently complete
to illustrate well the data that should be constantly available in a well-managed state
department.
The material thus brought together was analyzed and partially interpreted at the
statistical offices maintained by the Foundation, during the progress of the study,
at Lawrence, Kansas, under the direction of Mr. Homer W. Josselyn. For the needs of
the present volume having to do with the normal schools, the required results were
elaborated chiefly at New York.
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Instrume
Orchestr;
History (
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i
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ih lit
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CURRICULA
411
TABLE 2. COLLEGIATE OFFERINGS IN VARIOUS NORMAL SCHOOL DEPARTMENTS, 1917-18
KlRKSVILLE
WAKRENSBURG
C.GlRARDEAD
SPRINGFIELD
MARY VILLE
Extreme
JLv.
Far.
Teach- Sem.
Teach- Sem.
Teach- Sem.
Teac7b- Sem,.
Teach- Sem,
Sem.
Sem.
ers Hours
ers Hours
ers Hours
ers Hours
ers HOUIS
If ours
Hours
Education
91 52.5
12 87.5
11 76
10 55
6 52.5
647
35
English
5 70
5 80
4 793
5 45
3 60
66.9
35
Ancient Languages
1 425
1 35
1 91.3
2 42.5
1 47.5
51.8
56.3
Modern Foreign Languages
2 57.5
1 46.2
1 527
2 40
1 32.5
45.8
25
History and Political and
Social Science
6 100
5 70
3 56
4 37.5
3 50
627
62.5
Mathematics
4 37.5
3 32.5
2 22
1 32.5
3 25
29.9
15.5
Physics and Chemistry
2 47.5
3 37.5
2 32
1 15
1 32.5
32.9
32.5
Biological Sciences
2 12.5
3 25
1 22
1 15
1 20
189
10
Geography, Physiography
1 12.5
3 5
1 4
1 7.5
1 17.5
93
13.5
Agriculture
2 45
3 27.5
1 20
1 25
1 20
27.5
25
Fine Arts
2 51.2
2 32.5
2 8
1 22.5
1 35
298
43.2
Music
4 48.8
4 48.8
5 11.7
6 85
1 25
43.9
73.3
Commerce
2 27.5
1 26.2
1 34
1 15
1 30
26.5
19
Industrial Arts
2 27.5
1 41.8
1 28
1 32.5
2 22.5
30.5
193
Home Economics
2 40
2 35
2 29.7
1 275
1 35
334
12.5
Library Economy
— 7.5
— —
4
— —
— 12
2.5
63
Physical Training
2 188
2 17.5
2 5
2 88
3 10
12
13.8
Total
48 698.8
51 648
40 576 7
39 506.3
SO 516.2
589
192.5
Ratio3
14.6
12.7
14.4
13
172
TABLE 3. INDIVIDUAL CURRICULA ILLUSTRATIVE OF THE OPERATION OF
THE ELECTIVE SYSTEM IN MISSOURI NORMAL SCHOOLS
CASE 1. This is a fairly good example of an individual curriculum based upon a
group-requirement system. There are appropriate sequences in courses that rigor-
ously demand suitable prerequisitess such as mathematics and chemistry, but not else-
where; the practice teaching, necessarily limited to elementary school classes, has been
preceded neither by a study of elementary subject-matter nor by a course in "spe-
cial methods;" what is apparently required work in history is limited to ancient his-
tory; the two-term course in the history of education Is taken with the terms reversed;
and the course in school management comes at a most inappropriate time. It seems,
indeed, that the professional work is inserted wherever it will fit, without the slightest
reference to its bearing upon other courses. It will be noted, too, that while the stu-
dent has apparently intended to teach chemistry and mathematics, he actually teaches
physics, in which he has had but three terms of collegiate work; physiography, in
which he has had but two terms of secondary work; and agriculture, for -which his
equipment consists of two summer-quarter courses.
Mr. A. entered the normal school in the fall of 1908, and was in residence during the remainder of
the academic year, and during the first two quarters of the following year. He left in the spring, pre-
sumably to teach, but returned in the fall for a fuU year's work, followed by a summer quarter. He
taught a rural school for twelve weeks in the fall, returning for the second and third terms and the sum-
mer quarter. During the following year he also remained in residence for three terms and the summer
quarter. He received the degree of B.S. in Education at the close of this period (1913), and became
a teacher of physics, agriculture, and physical geography in a high school. His courses during this
period were as follows :
1 Throughout the table the number of teachers includes all who give instruction in the department. In many
cases the same teachers give instruction also in other subjects, hence the total is usually smaller than the sum of
the groups.
2 This ratio ignores the frequently considerable amount of secondary instruction required of these same teachers.
412
APPENDIX
First term
English grammar & composi-
tion
Elementary English & Ameri-
can literature
Ancient history (high school
course)
Algebra
Gymnasium
First term
Elementary psychology
Rhetoric
Plane geometry
Physical geography
Vocal music
First term
Practice teaching
Trigonometry
Solid geometry
Chemistry
Summer ', 1911
English literature
Analytical geometry
College physics
Chemistry
Spring,, 1912
History of education
German
Calculus
College physics
Winter, 1913
History of education
Nineteenth century poetry
German
Organic chemistry
FIRST YEAR
Second term
English grammar & composi-
tion
Elementary English & Ameri-
can literature
Ancient history (collegecourse)
Civil government
Algebra
Gymnasium
SECOND YEAH
Second term
Principles of teaching
Rhetoric
Plane geometry
Physical geography
Manual training
THIRD YEAR
Second term
Rhetoric
American constitution
Trigonometry
Chemistry
Manual training
Fall, 1911
(Student teaches a rural school)
Summer,
English literature
German
Calculus
Applied chemistry
Spring, 1913
Nineteenth century poetry
German
American government and
politics
Organic chemistry
Third term
Elementary English & American
literature
Ancient history (college course)
Civil government
Algebra
Gymnasium
Third term
(Student dropped out, presumably
to teach)
Third term
School management
American constitution
Political economy
Analytical geometry
High school physics
Chemistry
Winter, 1912
Applied chemistry (two courses)
Fall, 1912
School administration
Nineteenth century poetry
German
Organic chemistry
Summer, 1913
English literature
Electricity
Soil management
Com
CASE %. When it is remembered that the sixty-hour diploma designates ability to
teach in the elementary school, the inadequacy of this student's program is obvious.
Miss B., it will be noted, takes a full year of ancient history in the normal school. The
records show, however^ that she has already presented a unit of ancient history for
entrance, and that this is the only course in history presented for entrance. Conse-
quently, she has in all two years of ancient history, two terms of English history, and
only one term of American constitutional history to prepare her to teach United
States history in the elementary school. She was admitted to practice teaching in
the third term after having completed but one course that directly prepared for
practice teaching — and this was taken two terms earlier. Other professional courses
("methods" courses) she took in the later summer quarters, presumably after her
experience in teaching had shown her the need of such work.
CURRICULA
413
Miss B. entered the normal school in the fall of 1911. She presented for entrance 12 j high school units.
She remained in residence during the three terms of the academic year and the following summer
quarter. She apparently taught for the two years following, returning for the summer quarters of 1913
and 1914. At the close of the latter quarter she received the sixty-hour diploma. The work of the six
terms during which she was in residence appears below :
First term
Teaching of language and lit-
erature
Rhetoric
Ancient history
Vocal music
Chorus
High school Latin
Summer quarter, 1912
Methods of teaching music
Teaching of algebra and arith-
metic
"Teachers' special"
American literature
Shakespeare
FIRST YEAR
Second term
Nineteenth century literature
Advanced composition and ar-
gumentation
Ancient history
Drawing
Chorus
High school Latin
Summer quarter ', 1913
Eighteenth century prose
American constitutional his-
tory
English history
Vocal music
Harmony
Third term
Practice teaching
History of education
American literature
Ancient history
Drawing (two courses)
Chorus
High school Latin
Summer quarter, 1914
Nineteenth century literature
Library economy
American government and pol-
itics
English history
Harmony
CASE 8. The inadequacy of this curriculum, likewise, as a preparation for elemen-
tary school teaching is apparent. The student is plunged at the very outset into re-
sponsible practice teaching, undertaking at the same time two courses which are sup-
posed both to be consecutive and to be prerequisites to such teaching. She is appar-
ently ambitious to teach Latin and history in the high school, altho she accepts a
sixty-hour diploma "designating ability" to teach in the elementary school. For some
reason she elects a full year of agriculture and a term of manual training. It is possi-
ble— and indeed probable — that these elections are made simply and solely to meet
group requirements. Certainly, the wisdom of a group-requirement system that per-
mits and apparently encourages a program of this type is seriously to be questioned.
Miss C. B. entered the normal school in the fall of 1909. She remained in residence for two terms. She
returned in the summer quarter of 1911, and remained for this and the three succeeding terms. The
work for the sixty-hour diploma was completed in the summer quarters of 1913 and 1914. She pre-
sented fifteen secondary units for entrance. The courses completed in the normal school follow :
First term
Elementary psychology
Principles of teaching
Practice teaching
Trigonometry
Vocal music
FIRST YEA.U
Second term
Principles of teaching
Teaching of language and lit-
erature
Trigonometry
Gymnasium
Summer quarter, 1911
Vergil
Ancient history
History of mathematics
Agriculture
First term, 1911
Practice teaching
American literature
Cicero
Sallust
Ancient history
SECOKD YEAH
Second term^ 1911
Advanced composition and ar-
gumentation
Ovid
English history
Horace
Manual training
Third term,
Advanced composition and ar-
gumentation
Vergil
English history
Farm crops
414 APPENDIX
Summer quarter, 1913 Summer quarter, 1914
Teaching of Latin History of education (two
American literature terms' work at the same
English history time)
Cereals American literature
Vocal music Library economy
CASE 4. It would be difficult to determine from an inspection of this program what
this prospective teacher intends to teach. Altho she presented for entrance nearly two
years' work in algebra, we find her electing a full year of algebra in the normal school
and receiving credit for it toward the fifteen needed units of secondary work. She takes
a term of Latin and a term of drawing. A collegiate professional course in the teach-
ing of English is taken with only high school English as a background. A term of
ancient history of high school grade is inserted between two terms of oriental history
of collegiate grade, in the first term of which she had apparently been condi tioned.
A single term of chemistry in the final summer quarter is paralleled by two courses
in household science and one course in home nursing. Aside from chemistry, twelve
weeks1 work in "corn" and the same amount of time spent on "cereals55 (perhaps in-
cluding "corn"") apparently meet the "group requirements" in science.
Miss D. entered the normal school in the summer quarter of 1907. Her high school credits aggregated
only 13J units; hence her six terms' work at the normal school include several secondary courses. Five
years elapsed between her first term's work in 1907 and her second term's work in the summer of 1912.
After finishing a quarter, she taught (apparently) for one term, reentering for the second and third
terms of 1912-13, and remaining for the summer quarter of 1913. After another year of teaching (ap-
parently), she returned to finish the work for the sixty-hour diploma in the summer of 1914. Her
courses at the normal school were the following:
Summer quarter, 1907 Summer quarter., 1912 Winter •,
Oriental history (collegiate) Psychology Teaching of history-
English (high school) School economy Principles of teaching
Latin (first year high school) Teaching of English Teaching of arithmetic and
Music Sanitation algebra
Drawing Practice teaching
Music Algebra (high school)
Spring, 1913 Summer, 1913 Summer, 1914
Practice teaching Oriental history (making up High school curriculum prob-
Library economy condition ?) lems
Advanced composition Practice teaching Chemistry
Corn School administration Food preparation
Ancient history (high school) Cereals Household decoration
Algebra (high school) Algebra (high school) Home nursing
Gymnasium Gymnasium
CASE 5. From several points of view, this program is much better than any of those
that have been previously discussed. The academic subjects are in the main well artic-
ulated and, generally speaking, each is extended over a period that is long enough
to ensure a dividend from the time and energy expended. But the program is not
satisfactory as a preparatory curriculum for elementary teaching. In the four years'
work leading to the sixty-hour diploma the only elementary school subjects are Eng-
lish, American history, arithmetic, drawing, and music, and in each of these cases,
with the possible exception of English, the courses taken are quite inadequate. One
is tolerably certain that this student, while willing to teach in the elementary school
as a means to an end, is really looking forward to high school teaching. Whatever
work is done in preparation for elementary teaching, therefore, is quite likely to be
done more or less perfunctorily.
CURRICULA
415
Miss E. enters the normal school in the fall of 1908, and is in residence during the succeeding academic
year. She apparently teaches for a year, returning in the fall of 1910 and remaining thru the winter
and spring into the summer quarter of 1911. She remains out of school until the spring of 1912, when
she returns for the spring and summer quarters. She repeats this process in 1913, and finally com-
pletes the work for the sixty-hour diploma in the summer of 19 14-. About one-third of her preparatory
work is done in secondary classes of the normal school Her program follows :
Fall, 1908
English
Beginning Latin
Algebra
Music (sight reading)
Fall, 1910
English literature
Caesar
Algebra
Zoology
Civil government
CHIEFLY SECONDARY WORK
Winter, 1908
English
Latin
Plane geometry
Music (sight reading)
Manual arts
Winter, 1910
Principles of teaching (collegi-
ate)
Rhetoric
Caesar
European history
Algebra
Zoology
Spring, 1909
English
Latin
Plane geometry
Psychology (collegiate)
American history
g, 1911
Zoology (collegiate)
Rhetoric
Caesar
European history
Civil government
Physiology
Summer, 1911
Teaching arithmetic and alge-
bra (collegiate)
Practice teaching
School economy
Solid geometry
Drawing (secondary)
Spring* 1913
Vergil
Mediaeval history
Trigonometry
History of education
CHIEFLY COLLEGIATE WORK
Spring, 1912
School administration
English literature
Cicero
College algebra
Summer, 1913
English literature
Mediaeval history
Trigonometry
Physics
Summer, 1912
English literature
Vergil
Mediaeval history
College algebra
Summer, 191$.
Practice teaching
History of education
Library economy
Analytical geometry
Physics
CASE 6. This program illustrates another attempt to kill two occupational birds
with one educational stone. The student apparently wished to earn a certificate for ele-
mentary teaching, and took two terms' work at the normal school to enable her to do
so. One-half of the twelve courses that formed her program during these two terms
have no conceivable relation to elementary school teaching, yet she was not only per-
mitted to take these courses, but was also given credit for them toward an elementary
certificate.
Miss F. spent two terms in the normal school, entering with advanced standing from one of the col-
leges. She received the thirty-hour diploma at the close of the second quarter. Toward this diploma
she was granted credit for the following courses taken in college : psychology, ethics, Bible, history
of American literature, German (first year), vocal music, food preparation.
Her normal school work comprised the following courses :
Spring, 1914
Principles of teaching
Teaching of history
Teaching of English
Library economy
Summer* 1914
Practice teaching
Teaching of arithmetic
Bookkeeping (two courses)
Typewriting (three courses)
Shorthand
416 APPENDIX
CASES 7, 8, 9. The character of the courses elected in the thirty-hour curriculum is
even more important than the character of the work elected in the sixty-hour curricu-
lum. The cases cited here are not exceptional ; they are rather fairly typical of the
thirty -hour elections in at least three of the Missouri schools. The brief time afforded
by one year's training beyond the high school (the last case cited represents indeed
only two terms of collegiate work) should not be wasted thru divided interest and a
plurality of vocational objectives. If it is necessary to prepare elementary teachers
upon so slender a basis as one yearns training, there can certainly be no justification
for not concentrating this training upon the problems that the elementary teacher
must face and solve.
Miss G. received the thirty-hour diploma in 1914. Fourteen courses of collegiate grade formed the
basis of the credits upon which the diploma was issued. Six of these fourteen courses were German
(three courses), Latin (Ovid and Sallust), photography.
Miss H. was granted the thirty-hour diploma in 1914, and had earned in addition fifteen semester
hours toward the sixty-hour diploma. Twelve and one-half hours are represented by ancient history,
mediaeval history, trigonometry, zoology.
Mr. I. received the elementary certificate in 1914. Out of eight courses of collegiate grade for which
credit was granted for this certificate, four were college algebra, analytical geometry, college physics
(two courses).
CASE 10. This student's career illustrates clearly the actual working out of the the-
ory upon which the curricula of the Missouri normal schools are constructed. Mr. J.
receives the elementary certificate after completing in the normal school some thirty-
eight courses, all of secondary grade. He had previously taught in rural and village
elementary schools, but now with a certificate from the normal school, he is acceptable
for appointment in a small high school. Attendance for five more terms at the normal
school brings him to the "life certificate" and the degree of Ped.B. With this cer-
tificate, he receives an appointment as an elementary teacher in a small city system,
altho the normal school has prepared him only very meagrely for the responsibili-
ties of this position. Still further work — three terms in the normal school and three
years' attendance upon Saturday classes at a neighboring university — earns for him
the A.B. degree which is granted by the normal school. He is now an elementary
school principal in a large city system, — again a position for which the courses that
he took in the professional school have given him but slight training. These courses
aggregated sixty-seven in number, and were rewarded at three successive points by di-
plomas or degrees each licensing the holder to teach in any public school of the state.
Mr. J. received the A.B. degree from one of the normal schools in 1912. The courses which he com-
pleted and the kind of teaching which he did in the interims of normal school residence are shown
in the following tabular statement :
Summer quarter, 1904- School year, 1904-05 Summer, 1905 Fall* 1905
Oriental history Teacher, rural school English English
Physical geography Latin (first year, high Latin
school) American history
Algebra (first year, high Plane geometry
school) Reading and speaking
Reading and voice cul- Gymnasium
ture
Manual training
CURRICULA
Winter, 1905
Teacher, Grades IV-
VIII, village school
Winter, 1906
Rhetoric
Latin (Caesar)
Solid geometry
Reading and voice cul-
ture
Summer, 1908
Practice teaching
English fiction
Shakespeare
Latin (Caesar)
Physical geography
Spring, 1909
Mediaeval and modern
history
College algebra
School year, 1910-11
Elementary school prin-
cipal, large city sys-
tem; student, Satur-
day classes, neighbor-
ing university
Spring, 1906
Pedagogy
English
Latin
Spring, 1907
Practice teaching
History of English liter-
ature
Latin (Caesar)
American constitutional
history
Trigonometry
Manual training
Fall, 1908
History of education
Mediaeval and modern
history
Advanced literature
Physics
Library economy
Summer, 1909
School administration
American literature
Library (two courses?)
Mediaeval and modern
history
Trigonometry
(Degree B.Pd. granted,
August, 1909)
Summer, 1911
German (two courses)
College physics
Summer, 1906
Pedagogy
Rhetoric
Roman history
Summer, 1907
Pedagogy
Surveying (three
courses)
(Elementary certificate
granted, August,
190T)
Winter, 1908
Practice teaching
History of education
History of American
literature
School year, 1909-10
Eighth grade teacher,
small city system
School year,
Elementary school prin-
cipal, large city sys-
tem; student, Satur-
dayclasses, neighbor-
ing university
Fall, 190G
Psychology
Rhetoric
Latin (Caesar)
Plane geometry
Manual training
School year, 1907-08
Teacher of all first-year
subjects in a small
high school
Jan. 15- Apr. 15, 1909
Teacher of English and
mathematics in a
small high school
Summer, 1910
Latin (Cicero)
German
College physics
Typewriting
Summer, 1912
German
Latin (Sallust and
Cicero)
TABLE 4. CITY TRAINING SCHOOL CURRICULA
THE HARRIS TEACHERS COLLEGE CURRICULUM FOR KINDERGARTNERS1
First Semester
Drawing
English
Geography
Hygiene
Music
Penmanship
Physical training
Science
Kindergarten
Observation (kindergarten)
Semester hours
4
Second Semester
Drawing
History
Music
Observation (kindergarten)
Physical training
Primary
Psychology
Reading
Science
Kindergarten
Semester hours
5
1
3
A
27
1 From the Report of the St. Louis Board of Education, for 1914-15, pages 100, 101.
418
APPENDIX
TABLE 4 (continued). A. THE HARRIS TEACHERS COLLEGE CURRICULUM FOE KINDERGABTNEKS
TJiird Semester
Apprentice work
Fourth Semester
Full time Child psychology
Drawing
English
History of education
Music
Physical training
Theory of education
Kindergarten
Primary
1
4
2
1
5
5
J?
25
B. THE KANSAS CITY TEACHER-TRAINING CURRICULUM
First Semester
Biology
Psychology
Drawing
Physiology and hygiene
Songs and games
First Semester
First T&n Weeks
Primary or upper grade methods
Physiology and hygiene
School management
History
Physical education or music
Arithmetic
Teaching
Second Ten Weeks
FIRST YEAR
5 hours
3
3
3
J?
20
Second Semester
Geography
General methods
Literature and reading
Grammar and composition
Music
SECOND YEAR
Second Semester
Third Ten Weeks
3 hours American history
% Physiology and hygiene
3 School administration
5 Sociology
2 Arithmetic
3 Physical education or music
20
Fourth Ten Weeks
Full time Community civics
Nature study
History of education
Current educational theory
Literature or elective
3 or
5 hours
4
5
3
__3
20
5 hours
2
3
5
3
4> hours
3
3
5
3
18 or!
III. DATES OF THE FIRST ESTABLISHMENT OF
STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS
Massachusetts
1838
Maine 1863
Texas
1879
Washington
1890
New York
18442
Indiana 1865
North Dakota
1881
Oklahoma
1891
Connecticut
1849
Wisconsin 1865
South Dakota
1881
Idaho
1893
Michigan
1849
Vermont 1866
Oregon
1883
Montana
1893
Rhode Island
1852
Delaware 1866
Virginia
1884
New Mexico
1893
Iowa
1855
Nebraska 1867
Louisiana
1884
South Carolina
1895
New Jersey
1855
West Virginia 1867
Arizona
1885
Maryland
1896
Illinois
1857
Utah 1869
Wyoming1
1886
Ohio
1900
Minnesota
1858
Missouri 1870
Florida
1887
Kentucky
1906
Pennsylvania
1859
New Hampshire 1870
Nevada
1887
Alabama
1907
California
1862
Arkansas 1872
Colorado
1889
Tennessee
1909
Kansas
1863
North Carolina 1876
Georgia
1889
Mississippi
1910
1 This curriculum went into effect in September, 1917.
2 Training-classes in academies established in 1834.
NORMAL SCHOOL TEACHERS
IV. NORMAL SCHOOL TEACHERS
419
THE following tables present the more Important data concerning the instructors in
the five state normal schools. Tables 5—14 deal with individuals employed during the
year 1914—15, and the remaining tables are based upon information for the year
1915-16, including the summer of 1916.
TABLE 5. AGE AND SEX DISTRIBUTION
Ages
21 to 25
26 to 30
31 to 35 | 36 to 40
41 to 45
46 to 50
51 to 55
56 to 60
61 to 65
66 to 70
Sub-
Total
No
Record
Total
Men
"Women
1
17
% 1 %
16 j 23
23 I IS
21
9
8
8
1
1
3
1
99
8U
7
£»
106
93
Both
6
21
19 1 20
17
9
5
1
1
1
183
16
199
TABLE 6. OCCUPATION OF FATHER
-Agriculture
and
Forestry
Trade
Professional
All
Other
Occupations
Sub-
Total
No Record*
Retired, or
Deceased
Total
Men
67.5
11
17.5
4
92
14
106
Women
31
S3
22
1U
83
10
93
Both
50
21
20
9
175
24
199
Occupational Distribution of Mis-
souri Census 1910
35.5
11.1
4.7
48.7
TABLE 7. NUMBER OF OTHER TEACHERS IN THE FAMILY
None
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six or
•more
Siifc-
2btaZ
No
Record
Total
Men
20
25
25
15
10
3
2
98
8
106
Women
89
26
23
15
#
5
3
88
5
S3
Both
24
25
24
15
6
3
3
186
IS
199
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APPENDIX
TABLE 10. SOURCES OF DEGREES
Number holding degrees
University of Missouri
Missouri Normal Schools
University of Chicago
Drury College (Missouri)
Columbia University
University of Kansas
Central College (Missouri)
University of Michigan
Indiana University
University of Wisconsin
Missouri Valley College (Missouri)
Harvard University
Brown University
Vanderbilt University
University of Pennsylvania
Illinois Wesleyan University
Other Missouri Colleges2
Other Middle Western Colleges
Other Eastern Colleges
Other Southern Colleges
Foreign and Western
Bachelor's Degree
Master's Degree
Doctor's Degre
No.
%
No.
%
No. %
1381
100
52
100
7 100
37
27
16
31
... ...
17
12
... ...
10
7
6
11
1 14.2
9
6
2
4
».. ...
7
5
6
11
1 14.2
5
4
3
2
2
4
»..
3
2
2 29
2
1.5
3
6
...
2
1.5
2
4
2
1.5
...
...
2
4
1
1
4
7.5
1
2
1 14,2
...
1 142
1 14.2
8
6
2
4
20
14
4
7.5
&
4
2
4
5
4
...
2
1.5
...
...
... ...
TABLE II. COMBINATIONS OF TRAINING
Normal Schools
Men Women Total
High School, Normal School, College
High School, College, Graduate
High School, Normal School
High School, College
High School, Normal School, College, Graduate
High School
Normal School, College, Graduate
Normal School
Normal School, College
High School, Normal School, Graduate
College
College, Graduate
Normal School and Graduate
Special School Training
12
34 23
SO
1# 22
8
83 14
9
12 11
12
9 11
8
& 6
5
3 4
2
5 3
5
1 3
5
2
2
1
1
.5
1
... .5
100
100 100
University of Missouri
74
10
100
TABLE 19. TOTAL TEACHING EXPERIENCE
Number of years
Ito2
3 to 5
6 to 8
9 to 12
13 to 16
17 to 20
21 to 25
26 to 30
31-
5 or
less
More
than
12
Total
No.
Normal Schools
Men
Women
Both
University of Missouri
Men
Women
Both
%
3
8
5
7
28
9
%
6
13
9
24
14
23
%
15
17
16
14
%2
15
%
16
#4
20
16
14
%
16
11
14
11
30
%
15
12
14
11
n
12
%
14
9
11
11
14
11
%
7
5
6
2
2
%
8
1
5
4
4
%
9
SI
14
31
W
32
%
60
$8
50
39
B6
39
101
91
192
132
14
146
1 Three teachers holding higher degrees gave no information as to their bachelor's degrees, which are here omitted.
2 Colleges not listed have but one graduate.
NORMAL SCHOOL TEACHERS
TABLE 13. COMBINATIONS OF TEACHING EXPERIENCE (GROUPS MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE)
Men Women Total
Administrative, including1 varying teaching experience
Elementary and Secondary
Elementary only
Secondary only
Elementary, Secondary, and College
Normal School only
Secondary and College
College only
Elementary and College
42
13
7
10
11
4
6
5
__2
100
h
30
SO
8
S
10
100
TABLE 14. VARIETIES OF TEACHING EXPERIENCE (GROUPS OVERLAP)
Men Women
Secondary
Grade School
Rural School
Principal of Secondary School
City Superintendent
Principal of Elementary School
College
University
Normal School only
County Superintendent
State Superintendent
76
46
64
50
39
29
19
16
4
10
2
SO
66
11
14
k
10
1
24
22
18
6
3
100
Total
%
63
56
54
31
22
19
17
10
7
3
1
TABLE 15. DISTRIBUTION OF ANNUAL SALARIES, 1915-161
KJRKSVILLE
WARRENSBURG
CAPE
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
TOTALS
UNIVERSITY OF
GlRARDEAU
MISSOURI2
Less than $900
%
%
%
%
%
%
%
Men
9
2
1
Women
7
...
...
2
...
Both
8
2
1
$901 to $1200
Men
9
...
...
6
3
2
Women
ItS
16
25
S3
83
29
10
Both
22
7
10
20
16
15
3
$1201 to $1500
Men
23
4.5
11
8
6
11
18
Women
S3
SB
AS
61
Itf
U7
50
Both
25
27
24
37
20
27
21
$1501 to $1800
Men
32
41
33
31
75
42
8
Women
Ik
SI
25
...
n
18
Both
25
• 37
30
is
56
31
7
$1801 to $2400
Men
27
50
50
61
13
40
25
Women
7
8
6
...
b
ItO
Both
20
27
33
30
8
24
26
Over $2400
Men
45
6
...
...
2
46
Women
...
...
Both
*2
3
...
1
42
Median
Men
(22)3$1680
(22) $1950
(18) $1860
(13) $1920
(16) $1650
(91) $1800
(101) $2200
Women
(14) 3380
(19) 1500
(1#) 1500
(IS) 13&0
(9) IbOO
(7S) 1MO
(10) 1££7
Both
(36) 1500
(41) 1750
(30) 1650
(31) 1400
(25) 1650
(163) 1650
(111) 2200
1 Only regular, full-time instructors receiving more than $800 are represented.
2 The Salaries of all regular normal school teachers are paid in twelve parts and are based upon four twelve-week
terms of service— a fact which should be borne in mind when comparison is made with workers in other ftelds, the
university, for example, where the salary is for two semesters or the equivalent of three terms at the normal schools.
Pay for instruction during the summer session is two-thirds of pro rata in addition at the university, while at the
normal schools it is a part of the year's salary. To allow for this difference, the university salaries in the table have
been increased by two-ninths, making- them comparable, for similar length of service, with salaries at the normal
schools
8 The numbers in parenthesis indicate the number of teachers considered.
II
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NORMAL SCHOOL TEACHERS
425
TABLE 17. LENGTH OF WEEKLY PROGRAMS, 1915-16
KlRKSVILLE
WARRENSBURG
CAPE GXRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
TOTAL
Hours per week
Less than 20
%
%
%
%
%
%
Regular Session
28
6
54
12
35
26
Summer Session
18
5
58
3
19
18
Total
26
6
55
9
29
23
20 to 24
Regular Session
71
44
41
57
49
52
Summer Session
67
30
38
30
46
40
Total
69
39
40
47
48
49
25 to 29
Regular Session
1
44
5
20
16
19
Summer Session
15
60
4
50
27
35
Total
5
49
5
31
20
24
30 to 34
Regular Session
6
9
3
Summer Session
5
17
8
7
Total
6
12
3
4
35 hours and over
Regular Session
2
<1
Summer Session
Total
1
<1
NOTE : Teachers of fine arts, industrial arts, commercial subjects, library economy, music, and physi-
cal training, together with all teachers receiving $800 or less are omitted. Laboratory periods are
reckoned at one-half the time value of lecture or recitation periods.
TABLE 18. SALAEIES OF NORMAL SCHOOL TEACHERS ACCORDING TO THEIR GRADE OF
WORK, 1915-16
College Glasses
only
College Classes
chiefly
Secondary Classes
cliieHy
Secondary Classes
only
Per cent of group
Men
Women
Both
%
13
3
10
%
52
S9
48
%
31
58
38
%
4
6
4
Average monthly salary
Men
Women
Both
$176
113
170
$157
136
149
$153
119
139
$133
9®
117
NOTE: The above table includes only regular, full-time instructors receiving over $800. All training-
school instructors and teachers of special subjects have also been omitted.
TABLE 19. EXTENT OF SECONDARY WORK REPORTED BY THE FORTY-ONE BEST-TRAINED
NORMAL SCHOOL TEACHERS, 1915-16
A. Proportion of Secondary Student Grades
KTRKSVILLE
WARRENSBURG
CAPE G-TRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARTVTLLE
TOTAL
Whole year
Summer only
31%l
15%
39%
27%
28%
26%
38%
26%
53%
48%
36%
26%
Whole year
Summer only
B, Proportion of Secondary Classes
37%
81%
1 That is, 31 per cent of the student grades reported by the members of this "best-trained " group who taught at
Kirksvill'e were given for secondary work ; the balance were collegiate.
426
APPENDIX
TABLE 20. TRAINING- OF EIGHTY-ONE1 TEACHERS WHO TAUGHT ONLY IN THE
SUMMEB SESSION, 1916
KlRKSVILLE
WARRENSBURG
CAPE
GlRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
TOTAL
Number of Teachers
Men
Women
Both
19
8
27
10
7
17
5
J
10
8
9
17
8
S
10
50
Jl
81
Advanced degrees from college or uni-
versity
%
%
%
%
%
%
Men
30
40
25
38
20
Women
Ik
a
Both
24
20
12
30
13
Four-year degrees or higher from col-
lege or university
Men
11
50
60
63
100
46
Women
08
29
20
56
50
S3
Both
19
41
40
59
90
43
Any college or university training
Men
42
70
80
100
100
70
Women
50
71
60
100
100
7A
Both
44
71
70
100
100
72
Degrees from first class institutions
Men
11
50
60
38
75
38
Women
38
29
20
S3
50
&2
Both
19
41
40
36
70
36
Four- year degrees from normal schools
Men
32
10
20
38
22
Women
13
...
S
Both
26
6
10
18
15
Any normal school training
Men
79
100
80
75
25
74
Women
75
71
100
75
100
81
Both
78
88
90
76
40
77
Trained in local normal school only
Men
58
30
20
30
Women
50
29
m
23
Both
56
29
20
27
Any local training
Men
79
100
60
50
25
68
Women
50
57
SO
67
50
61
Both
70
82
70
59
30
65
1 Thirteen other teachers were employed in the summer from whom these data could not Tt>e secured.
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APPENDIX
§ V. NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENTS
TABLE 93. A. CLASSIFICATION OF TOTAL ENROLMENT, 1913-14 l
KIRKS VILLE WARRENSBURG CAPE GIRARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARYVILLE
Collegiate Men
Collegiate Women
Secondary Men
Secondary Women
Total Men
Total Women
Total Both
170
501
262
5kS
432
lOltU
1476
225
901
235
566
460
1667
1927
140
8%S
234
Bk9
374
B1U
1048
167
556
365
8A3
532
1398
1930
68
109
114
872
182
572
753
TOTAL
770
8182
1210
$672
1980
515k
7134
B, "STANDARD" ENROLMENT, 1913-14.
KIRRSVILLE WARRENSBURG CAPE GIRARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARYVILLE
Standard enrolment2 887 1139 650 1084 424
Per cent of total enrolment
(Table 22 A) 60 69 62 56 56
TOTAL
4184
TABLE 23. PROPORTION OF MEN IN VARIOUS NORMAL SCHOOL CLASSIFICATIONS, 1913-14
KlRKSVJLLE
Reg. Sum. Both
Sess. Sess.
only
WARRENSBURG
Reg. Sum. Both
Sess. Sess.
only
CAPL GIRARDEAU
Reg. Sum. Both
Sess. Sess.
only
SPRINGFIELD
Reg. Sum. Both
Sess. Sess.
only
MARYVILL&
Reg. Sum. Both
Sess. Sess.
only
TOTAL
Reg. Sum. Both
Sess. Sess
OVlllJ
Collegiate
Secondary
Total
% % %
32s 20 25
41 19 33
37 19 29
% % %
25 16 20
36 23 29
30 19 24
% % %
33 26 30
50 27 40
42 27 36
% % %
26 20 23
33 26 30
31 24 28
% % %
22 30 25
32 17 23
28 21 24
% % %
28 20 24
38 23 31
34 21 28
TABLE 24. CHANGES IN THE PROPORTION OF MEN STUDENTS SINCE 1871 *
1871
55%
1881
59%
1891
47%
1901
43%
1911
33%
1914
28%
1 The figures here given total more than eight hundred fewer than the catalogued figures of the several schools for
the same year (8007). The difference is due mainly to a surprisingly large number of names listed in the catalogues
for which no trace of attendance was found; they either never appeared after registration "or speedily dropped out.
A few were in extension classes, and certain others were local members of gymnasium or music classes and not
bona fide students at the school.
2 The term "standard" enrolment is here applied to the enrolment of one student for three terms or 36 weeks. Re-
duced to such units, the total enrolment at each school is cut down by about two-fifths; the actual average enrol-
ment being for from 1.7 to 1.9 terms.
3 Thus, 32 per cent of the collegiate enrolment in the regular session at Kirksville were men, while only 20 per cent
of the collegiate students enrolling only in the summer were men.
4 Proportions at each school are for the years indicated except as follows : Warrensburg, 1873 ; Cape Girardeau, 1874 ;
Kirksville, 1882 and 1893, and Maryville, 1912.
NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENTS
429
TABLE 25. PROPORTION OF SECONDARY ENROLMENT, 1913-14*
EJRKSVILLE WARRENSBDRG CAPE GIRARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARYVILLE
TOTAL
Regular Session
Men
Women
Both
Attending in Summer only
Total Enrolment
Women
Both
Men
Women
Both
43
U5
45
61
53
54
53
kl
44
49
37
39
51
39
42
66
Ii9
56
56
55
65
63
52
71
60
65
57
59
60
63
64
53
55
61
76
72
63
65
65
65
53
67
55
51
52
61
52
65
TABLE 26. AGE DISTRIBUTION OF TOTAL ENROLMENT, 1913-14
Less Less
than than
16 17
Less
than than than
18 19 20
20
21
More More More More More More
than than than than than than
21 22 23 25 30 40
Collegiate Men
<1
1
4
9
19
11
10
60
48
Collegiate Women <1
1
5
11
24
16
13
47
37
Both
<1
1
3
11
23
15
12
50
40
100%
Secondary Men
3
8
16
29
43
14
10
33
24
Secondary Women $ 8
18
3k
47
12
9
38
25
Both
2
8
18
32
46
13
9
32
25
100%
Total Men
2
5
11
21
34
13
10
43
33
Total Women
1
4
11
23
5ff
14
11
39
31
Both
1
5
11
23
35
14
11
40
32
40
31
17
SO
19
26
24
25
19
11
12
16
15
TABLE 27. NATIONALITY OF PARENTS2
KIRKSVILLE WARRENSBURG CAPE GIRARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARYVILLE TOTAL
Parents of the same nationality
American
English
German
Irish
All Others
Parents of mixed nationality
Proportion of foreign strains
among parents in mixed group
English
German
Irish
All Others
65
5
4
1
<1
25
100
18
19
15
J8
100
54
5
5
2
2
_3§
100
20
16
12
52
100
35
a
11
Jl
100
17
19
12
52
100
51
12
4
2
1
JO
100
17
17
14
J>2
100
67
2
4
2
<1
J25
100
14
15
16
55
100
63
7
6
2
1
31
100
18
17
13
_52
100
1 Thus, in the regular session of 1913-14 at Kirksville, 68 per cent of the men were secondary students, the remaining
32 per cent being1 collegiate.
2 Question answered on 90 per cent of the student cards, 1915. See page 402, par. 5.
i
£!
sg
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«rs io o» co oo
OO CT» CO
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s
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NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENTS
431
TABLE 29. FATHER S INCOME l
Less than Less than Less than
$501
All Schools
%
Total
13
Total Men
16
Total Women
12
Collegiate Men
16
Collegiate Women
6
Secondary Men
16
Secondary Women
16
KIRKSVILLE
6
WARRENSBURG
11
CAPE GIRARDEAU
16
SPRINGFIELD
26
MARYVILLE
5
28
33
25
35
Ih
32
33
13
20
37
50
16
§1001
$1001-$1500
More than More than More than
100%
$1500
50
20
30
54
21
25
A7
19
SU
52
20
28
uk
SI
k5
55
22
23
56
17
27
36
22
42
42
24
34
57
19
24
73
14
13
36
20
44
$2000
19
15
SI
16
20
15
16
24
23
14
8
31
$3000
%
10
7
12
7
15
7
10
12
15
7
4
17
Total
Number
1146
468
678
187
279
281
899
265
207
222
286
166
TABLE 30. "IS TEACHING THE BEST-PAID EMPLOYMENT YOU COULD CONVENIENTLY
UNDERTAKE?"3
Collegiate Men Collegiate Women Secondary Men Secondary Women Total
Reporting "Yes" 43% M% 51% 88% 74%
TABLE 31. "ARE YOU SELF-DEPENDENT IN PAYING FOR YOUR EDUCATION?"3
Collegiate Men Collegiate Women Secondary Men Secondary Women Total
Reporting "Yes" 64
Reporting "No" 27
Reporting " Partly " 9
42
36
57
7
TABLE 32. SIZE OF FAMILY4
KIRKSVILLE WARRENSBURG C. GIRARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARYVILLE
No. of children
One
Two-Four
Five-Eight
Nine-Eleven
Twelve or more
5
40
41
13
1
100
38
43
11
_?
100
31
45
18
_J
100
25
48
19
_J>
100
3
38
45
12
2
100
TOTALS
Men Women Both
5
31
44
17
3
100
13
&
"wo
5
35
44
14
~J?
100
* Proportions based on student cards ; 60 per cent of the men and 41 per cent of the women replied to the question.
See page 402, par. 5.
2 Question answered on 87 per cent of the student cards. See page 402, par. 5.
« QuestionanSweredon99 per cent of the student cards from Kirksville, Warrensbure, and MaryvUle only. Seepage
402 par. 5.
* Question answered on 99 per cent of the student cards. See page 402, par. 6.
APPENDIX
TABLE 33. OTHER TEACHERS IN THE FAMILY 1
KIRKSVTLLE WARRENSBURG C. GIRARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARYVILLE
None
One or Two
Three or more
37
J.5
100
41
48
11
100
36
48
16
100
34
45
J21
100
44
48
8
100
TOTALS
Men Women Both
35
49
16
100
SO 38
A7 47
_m jus
100 100
TABLE 34. UHOW MANY OF YOUR FAMILY EVER ATTENDED A NORMAL SCHOOL?"2
KJRKSVILLE WARRENSBURG C. GIRARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARYVILLE TOTALS
Men Women Both
None
One
Two
Three or more
25
23
_26
100
35
23
20
22
100
34
25
23
JL8
100
40
21
18
Jl
100
43
25
15
17
100
31
23
22
_24
100
SO
100
35
24
20
JO.
100
TABLE 35. HIGH SCHOOL ATTENDANCE3
KIRKSVILLE WARRENSBURG CAPE GIRARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARYVILLE TOTAL
Any high school for any period %
Collegiate Men 56
Collegiate Women 75
Secondary Men 36
Secondary Women 50
First class high school for four years
Collegiate Men 19
Collegiate Women U)
73
86
54
43
64
77
36
SU
19
61
59
20
5k
68
86
65
61
40
55
65
81
47
55
TABLE 36. EATINGS, BY THEIE SCHOOL PRINCIPALS, OF 871 GEADTJATES
FROM FIFTY- EIGHT MISSOURI HIGH SCHOOLS OF THE FIRST CLASS
Showing* the relative proportions of different grades of ability in studies
and of different grades of personal quality found in the various occupa-
tion groups of these graduates immediately after leaving the high school
(For the discussion of these tables, see page 191)
A. Ratings of Ability distributed among Occupations
Number and Pro-
Rated '* A"
Rated "A"
Rated "JB"
Bated "J5"
Rated "C"
Rated "C"
portion in various
Occupations
(excellent)
in Studies
(excellent)
in Person-
(medium)
in Studies
(medium)
in Person-
(poor) in
Studies
(poor) in
Person-
ality
ality
ality
Men Women
Men Wo.
Men Wo.
Men Wo.
Men "PTo.
Men Wo.
Men Wo.
No. % No. %
% %
% %
% %
% %
% %
% %
At College or Univ.
159— 47 10£— 80
47 S3
65 SO
60 SO
41 16
36 5
32 9
At Normal School
9— 2.5 $9— 7
4 7
I 8
2 8
4 5
2 A
3 5
Teaching
80— 9 190— 36
15 IS
11 36
6 &
9 &?
6 JM
7 36'
In Business
44— 13 9— 2
10 1
9 <1
14 3
13 8
16 5
17 k
At Home
26— ' 7.5 m— 23
12 1U
5 13
3 27
4 J85
13 55
19 Al
Other Occupations
72— 21 66— 12
12 10
9 13
25 11
29 11
27 27
22 15
340—100 531—100
100 100
100 100
100 100
100 100
100 100
100 100
(101)* (205)
(106) (187)
(176) Gm)
(157) (03$)
(63) (56')
(77) (106')
1 Question answered on 97 per cent of the student cards. See page 402, par. 5.
2 Question answered on 98 per cent of the student cards. See page 402, par. 5.
3 Proportions based on entire enrolment for 1913-14.
* Figures in parenthesis indicate the numbers on which the percentages are based.
NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENTS
433
B. Ratings of Ability distributed within Occupational Groups
At College
Men Women
J.i Normal
Scliool
Men Women
Teaching
Men Women
In, Business
Men Women
.42 Home
Men Women
Other Occu-
pations
Men Women
Total
Men Women
(159) x (10&)
(% (ff
(30) (150)
(% } %
(2$ (IlP
(72) <g?)
(340) (&?1)
Rating- in Studies
A 30 hk
A 44.5 S0
A 50 AS
A 23 11
A 46 #A
A 17 &?
A 29 ^'5
B 55 53
B 44.5 56
B37 Afi
B54 5<5
B23 55
B60 k5
B52 51
C15 3
Cll 5
C13 6*
C 23 £J
C31 17
C23 2J
C19 11
100 100
100 10(9
100 100
100 100
100 100
100 100
100 100
Rating1 in Personality
A 43 5A
All SS
A 37 55
A 23 11
A 19 SO
A 14 $6
A 31 35
B 41 36
B 67 49
B47 50
B 48 AA.5
B23 &5
B 62 £0
B46 US
C 16 10
C22 13
C 16 1/7
C 29 AA 5
C 58 35
C24 SU
C 23 20
100 100
100 100
100 100
100 100
100 100
100 100
100 100
TABLE 37. COMPARISON OF COLLEGIATE RATINGS AT NORMAL SCHOOLS OF STUDENTS PREPARED
AT HIGH SCHOOLS WITH RATINGS OF STUDENTS PREPARED AT THE NORMAL SCHOOLS
(For the discussion of this table, see page 192)
KIRKSVILLE WARKENSBURG CAPE GIRARDEAU
N.S, ST. 8. AT.S. H.S. W.S. H.S.
Graduates in 1915 8u+ 15u+ 8u+ 15u-«- 8u-i- 15u +
Sixty-hour Class
17
%
4
23
62
11
157
%
2
22
71
5
25
%
12
29
42
17
49
%
5
24
54
17
SPRINGFIELD
N.S. H.S.
24
%
10
45
45
38
%
8
42
50
Number of cases 9 27
% %
Proportion of "A's0 23 29
"B's" €0 57
"CV 17 14
"ID'S"
Ninety-hour Class 3
Number of cases 25 23
Proportion of *' A's " 41 42
"B's" 49 50
"C's" 10 8
TABLE 38. PROPORTION OF STUDENTS REPORTING TEACHING EXPERIENCE4
KIRKSVILLE WARRENSBURG CAPE GIRARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARTVILLE TOTA
Collegiate Men
Collegiate Women
Secondary Men
Secondary Women
Total
68
76
27
51
57
64
66
41
50
58
61
SU
45
58
54
71
66
52
TABLE 39. DISTRIBUTION OP TEACHING EXPERIENCE 4
59
56
42
£3
52
65
65
42
53
57
reporting More than More than More then More than More than More than
Experience 1-5 mos. 6-9 mos. lyear $ years 2 years k years 5 years 10 mars
Collegiate Men 65
Collegiate Women 65
Secondary Men 42
Secondary Women S3
Total 57
2
13
50
»
15
AS
2
11
29
5
IS
S3
3
13
41
100%
39
35
19
06
29
29
IS
IS
22
IS
9
n
15
16
JS
6
9
11
1 Figures in parenthesis indicate the numbers on which the percentages are hased.
2 At Kirksville and Springfield passing- students are rated in three groups only.
8 Owing to the small numbers in the sixty-hour class at Kirksville, the ninety-hour graduates were studied also.
4 Proportions based on total enrolment for 1913-14.
APPENDIX
TABLE 40. UDO YOU PLAN TO TEACH PERMANENTLY?''
Reporting "No"
Collegiate Men
Collegiate Women
Secondary Men
Secondary Women
Total Men
Total Wonien
KJ&KSVILLE
%
70
53
90
60
WARRENSBURG
75
77
MARYVILLE
61
60
70
56
TOTAL
%
71
82
53
TABLE 41. KIND OF TEACHING SOUGHT BY THOSE INTENDING TO TEACH
IMMEDIATELY UPON LEAVING THE NORMAL SCHOOL1
High School
and Szipervision
Graded
Elementary School
Rural
Elementary ScJiool
Collegiate Men
Collegiate Women
Secondary Men
Secondary Women
Total Men
Total Women
82
U5
34
IS
55
29
13
9
59
55
39
35
TABLE 43. PROGRAMS SCHEDULED BY ALL COLLEGIATE STUDENTS IN 1913-14
Periods per week Less than
15
KlRKSVILLE %
Regular Session 10
Summer Session 10
WARRENSBURG
Regular Session
Summer-Session
SPRINGFIELD
Regular Session
Summer Session
MARYVILLE
Regular Session
Summer Session
Periods per week
CAPE GIRARDEAU
Regular Session
Summer Session
15
13
5
10
Less
than
13
12
26
Less than
More than
20
20-23
23
31
62
7
30
62
8
100%
11
84
5
16
82
2
100%
31
47
22
34
47
19
100%
21
75
4
26
69
5
100%
Less
than
Less
than
More More
than than
14
15
15-16
16 17
16
21
19
60 40
42
62
28
10 6
More than
25
More
than
18
20
3
More than
28
<1
More
than
19
More
than
20
3
1
Total
702
639
1148
852
761
605
360
172
Total
321
100%
1 Proportions based on student cards from Kirksvillet Warrensburg1, and Maryville only ; the question was added
to the card after the other schools had reported. See page 402, par. 5.
NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENTS
435
TABLE 43. PROGRAMS SCHEDULED BY ALL SECONDARY STUDENTS IN 1913-14
Periods per week Less than Less than
15 20
KlRKSVILLE % %
Regular Session 8 38
Summer Session 8 42
WARRENSBURG
Regular Session 3
Summer Session 2
CAPE GIRARDEAU
Regular Session 5
Summer Session 6
SPRINGFIELD
Regular Session 31
Summer Session 21
MARYVILLE
Regular Session 6
Summer Session 7
13
14
31
51
44
22
23
20-23
69
56
100%
90
86
100%
22
39
100%
39
44
100%
75
75
More than More than More than More than TOTAL
23 25 28 30
64
30
10
12
978
440
841
554
41
16
15
992
896
397
342
100%
TABLE 44. DISTRIBUTION OF STUDENT GRADES, 19I3-141
KlRKSVILLE
WARRENSBURG
C. GIRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
TOTAL
Coll. Sec. Tot.
ColL Sec. Tot.
Coll. Sec. Tot.
Coll. Sec. Tot
Coll. Sec. Tot
Coll. Sec. Tot
Passing Grades A
23 16 20
322
968
32 25 29
534
94 90 93
B
55 44 51
21 16 19
27 18 24
47 44 46
32 33 32
C
14 23 18
59 57 59
45 44 45
9 13 11
51 46 48
D2
10 15 12
10 14 11
487
Conditioned
222
333
496
132
111
Half Credit
232
Failed
173
253
263
364
233
253
Dropped
586
222
333
666
565
454
100 100 100
100 100 100
100 100 100
100 100 100
100 100 100
100 100 100
Total Grades
11,044
14,854
10,834
15,OP4
5,384
57,210
TABLE 45. SEASONAL VARIATION IN COLLEGIATE STUDENT FAILURE, 1913-14
KJRKSVILLE WARRENSBURG CAPE GIKARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARYVILLE TOTAL
Fall 2.1 1.9 2.8 1.7 1.6 2.1
Winter 2 2.1 1.3 3 2.2 2.1
Spring 1.4 2.3 1.4 6.4 3.4 3
Summer .6 * 1.9 1.5 .8 .7 1.2
1 These data cover all the work done during the entire year 1913-14 except at Warrensburgr, where, owing to the
destruction of the earlier records, the grades for 1915-16 were used.
2 Kirksville and Springfield group their passing grades in three instead of four divisions.
436
APPENDIX
TABLE 46. SIZE OF NORMAL SCHOOL CLASSES, 1915-16
Secondary
Collegiate
Less Less
than than
5 10
Less More More More
t?ian than than than
15 15-20 20 30 40
More
than
50
Less
than
3
iess i/ess
than than
5 10
Less
than
15
More More More
than t7ia,n than
15-20 20 30 40
More
than
50
KlRKSVILLE
%
%
% % % %
%
%
%
%
%
%
% %
%
%
%
Reg-. Sess.
3
16
25 28 47 13
3
2
3
12
39
58
12 30
13
5
2
Sum. Sess.
WARRENSBURG
S
S
S 27 65 45
100%
33
20
1
17
26
14 60
46
25
17
100%
Reg:. Sess.
—
20
41 17 42 10
S
1
1
5
30
53
19 28
10
2
1
Sum, Sess.
3
4
15 21 64 32
11
3
—
1
10
18
•>•• ....
16 66
_ ^ -s
41
17
4
CAPE G-IRARDEAU
100%
100%
Reg-. Sess.
—
6
23 23 54 25
10
4
2
13
37
54
14 32
14
8
4
Sum, Sess.
SPRINGFIELD
2
9
12 9 79 55
29
2
11
30
41
<^—_
12 47
y '
100%
31
20
6
100%
Reg-. Sess.
3
12
28 23 49 14
2
_
3
9
30
53
15 32
15
5
1
Sum. Sess.
MARYVILLE
8
16 18 66 25
2
2
1
15
36
*-
20 44
, Y — '
100%
29
12
4
100%
Reg-. Sess.
6
28
56 16 28 14
2
—
3
16
48
70
14 16
6
3
1
Sum. Sess.
TOTALS
4
8
23 22 55 33
100%
10
4
4
12
46
67
5 28
21
19
12
100%
Reg1. Sess.
2
16
34 21 45 15
4
1
2
10
36
66
15 29
12
5
2
Sum. Sess.
2
7
16 19 65 34
12
5
1
4
21
34
14 52
36
19
9
Both
2
13
27 21 52 22
7
3
2
8
31
49
*> — -
15 36
r
20
10
4
100%
100%
TABLE 47. PROPORTIONS OF LARGE AND SMALL CLASSES IN VARIOUS DEPARTMENTS, 1915-16
Secondary Classes
Regular Session
Less than ten More than thirty
Summer Session
Less than ten More than thirty
Latin
57
Education
27
Household Arts
36
History
26
German
29
All Subjects
15
Biolog-y
27
Geography
20
All Subjects
16
Latin
German
All Subjects
76
40
7
Education
History
English
Physics
Geography
Biology
Agriculture
Mathematics
Chemistry
All Subjects
33
33
29
28
20
34
NORMAL SCHOOL STUDENTS
437
TABLE 47 (continued). PROPORTIONS OF LARGE AND SMALL CLASSES
Collegiate Classes
Regular Session
Less than ten More than thirty
Latin
French
German
Mathematics
Spanish
Agriculture
Household Arts
Physics
Geography
Chemistry
Biology
History
English
Library Science
Education
All Subjects
70
60
54
50
44
44
43
42
40
35
29
27
25
20
36
Library Science
Education
All Subjects
75
27
12
Summer Session
Less than ten More than thirty
Latin
German
Spanish
French
Biology
Library Science
Household Aits
Physics
Chemistry
Mathematics
Agriculture
All Subjects
92
69
60
50
43
40
35
27
26
23
22
21
Geography
Library Science
Education
Biology
English
History
Agriculture
Chemistry
All Subjects
60
56
43
42
31
26
26
36
TABLE 48. NUMBER OF FOUR- YEAR BACHELOR'S DEGREES FROM
MISSOURI STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS
1907 1908 1909 1910 1911 1912 1913 1914 1915 1916 1917
KIRKSVILLE
WARRENSBURG-
CAPE GIRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
TOTAL
TOTAL
1
1
0
4
6
7
16
22
29
32
45
163
0
0
2
2
6
1 2
1
3
8
12
20
55
0
3
10
1
6
8
5
4
5
13
9
63
0
0
0
0
0
0
1
0
9
9
10
29
_0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
12
12
1
4
12
7
16
17
23
29
51
66
96
322
TABLE 49. SUBSEQUENT EMPLOYMENT OF RECIPIENTS OF NORMAL
SCHOOL CERTIFICATES IN 1915 x
KIRKSVILLE
WARRENSBURG
C. GIRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
TOTAL
Men Wo. Both
Men Wo. Both
Men Wo. Both
Men Wo. Both
Men Wo. Both
Number of Certificates issued
102 S36 338
127 kSl 578
101 261 362
95 $96 391
425 l£t& 1669
Teaching
72 69 70
71 68 69
75 77 77
84 79 80
75 73 73
Students
23 17 19
12.5 1U 13
16 10 12
12 9 9
16 15.5 13
Business, At Home, etc.
4 11 9
8.5 7 8
576
498
5 8.5 8
No Record
132
8 11 10
465
— 83
4 6 6
100 100 100
100 100 100
100 100 100
100 100 100
100 100 100
Distribution of those Teaching
Rural Schools
22 29 27
36 Ul 40
36 19 23
43 37 38
S3 55 33
Elementary Grades
8 $7 29
22 l& 41
24 57 55
26 54 47
20 51 43
High Schools
28 $6 26
36 11 16
25 13 16
22 9 IS
28 13 17
Normal School or College
1 S 2
2 <1 <1
111
1 <1 1
211
Supervision
31 1 10
2—1
13—4
8—2
13 <1 4
Other Teaching
10 5 6
2 S 2
111
— <1 <1
322
100 100 100
100 100 100
100 100 100
100 100 100
100 100 100
1 This information was not obtainable from Maryville.
458
APPENDIX
TABLE 50. DISTRIBUTION OF RECIPIENTS OF DIPLOMAS OB CERTIFICATES IN 1915 BY
CLASSES AMONG THEIR VARIOUS SUBSEQUENT OCCUPATIONS
CURRICULUM
Teaching in :
Rural Schools
Graded Elementary Schools
High Schools
Normal Schools or Colleges
Other Positions
Superintendents
(Number teaching)
Total Teaching
Students
Others
No Record
(Diplomas or certificates issued)
Four-Year Three-Year Two-Year
Collegiate Collegiate Collegiate
11
53
17
19
100
(36)
74
20
4
2
100
(49)
2.5
21
59
2.5
1
14
100
(89)1
74
10
13
3
100
(121)
11
56
28
1
1
3
100
(338)1
76
13
10
2
100
(449)
One-Year
Collegiate
32
1
2
100
(517)1
72
16
5
7
100
(720)
Rural
Certificate
84
16
100
(245)
100
(330)
Total
34
44
17
1
1
3
100
(1225)1
73
13
8
6
100
(1669)
§VI. TEACHING POPULATION2
TABLE 51. TEACHERS IN GRADED ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS, 1915. DURATION OF NORMAL
SCHOOL ATTENDANCE
Terms :
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
One year or more
Two years or more
Three years or more
Four years or more
TOTAL NUMBER
KIRKSVILLE WARRENSBURG C. GIRARDEAU SPRINGFIELD MARYVILLE
23
11
15
15
66
27
11
7
27
16
15
12
5
8
57
25
11
5
20
15
15
10
65
15
7
23
20
19
14
7
6
67
17
4
1
19
16
22
10
5
10
TOTAL
No. %
364
253
256
189
103
122
935
387
149
77
23
16
17
12
7
235
529
265
421
102
1562
TABLE 5%. TEACHERS IN GRADED ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS, 1915. PROPORTION" OF TERMS
SPENT AT EACH NORMAL SCHOOL IN COLLEGIATE WORK
KlRKSVILLE
WAR.RENSBURG
C. GIRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
TOTAL
No. of coll.
No. of coll.
No. of coll.
No of coll.
No. of coil.
No. of coll.
Teachers in
terms %
terms %
terms %
terms %
terms %
terms %
Larger systems 3
40 44*
275 75
29 78
659 82
21 64
924 76
Rest of state
450 57
910 66
432 46
306 49
199 59
2297 57
TOTAL
490 66
1185 68
461 48
865 66
220 59
3221 61
TABLE 53. TEACHERS IN GRADED ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS, 1915. DISTRIBUTION OF TERMS
OF COLLEGIATE NORMAL SCHOOL ATTENDANCE
KIRKSVILLE WARRENSBURG C, GIRARDEAU SPRJLNGFLELD MARYVILLE
Teachers in
Larger systems 8
Rest of state
TOTAL
4
19.5
15
39.5
87
3
19
14
61
13
21
TOTAL
No. %
924 100
2297 100
3221 100
1 Three, seven, twelve, and twenty-two belonging respectively to the three-year, two-year, one-year, and total
groups failed to define their positions, and are therefore included in the sub-totals but not in the distribution.
2 See page 405. 3 See page 364, note 1. * The remaining terms —56 per cent— were devoted to secondary work.
TEACHING POPULATION
489
TABLE 54. TEACHERS IN GRADED ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS, 1915. NUMBER REPORTING
COLLEGIATE WORK AT NORMAL SCHOOLS WITH AVERAGE NUMBER OF
TERMS OF ATTENDANCE
Teachers in
Larger systems
Rest of state
KlRKSVILLE
No. No. of
terms
9 4.4
123 37
WARRENSBURG
No. No. of
terms
89 31
264 3 4
C. GIRARDEAU
No. No. of
terms
8 3.6
136 3 2
SPRINGFIELD
No. No of
terms
157 3.6
112 27
MARYVILLE
No. No. of
terms
6 3.5
50 4
TOTAL
No. No of
terms
269 34
685 3.4
TOTAL
132 37
353 3.4
144 32
269 3.2
56 3.9
954 3.4
TABLE 55. TEACHERS IN GRADED ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS, 1915. HIGH SCHOOL PREPARATION
OF 1556 TEACHERS WHO HAD ATTENDED STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS
KlRKSVILLE
WARRENSBURG
CAPE GIRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
TOTAL
Less than
one year
%
19
10
17
6
16
12
Less than
two years
35
23
35
19
28
Less than
three years
46
32
50
29
Less than
four years
55
44
63
43
54
49
Four years
or more
45
56
37
57
46
61
TABLE 56. HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS, 1915 (EXCEPT ST. LOUIS AND KANSAS CITY)
DISTRIBUTION OF COLLEGIATE TRAINING
1st Class
High Schools
3d <& 3d Class
High Schools
Total, 1st, 3d <& 3d
Class High Schools
Unclassified
High Schools
Men Women Both
Men Women Both
Men Women Both
% % %
Men Women Both
Colleges or universities
% % %
% % %
% % %
only1
55 53 53
32 26 28
60 J,6 47
9 S7 20
Mo. State University
39 36 37
31 SI 23
37 S3 84
9 Ik 12
Mo. State University
only
8 lit. 13
867
8 IS 11
555
Mo. State Normal
Schools only
13 13 13
27 SU 32
16 18 17
36 SB 37
Colleges or universities
and Mo. State Normal
Schools
25 29 28
22 BO 28
24 %9 28
14 19 17
Secondary work only at
high school, academy,
or normal school
166
19 10 12
10 7 8
41 IB 26
TOTAL
(212^100 (636)100 (838)100
(59)100 (177)100 (236)100
(271)100 (808)100 (1074)100
(22)100 (37)100 (59)100
TABLE 57. HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS, 1915 (EXCEPT ST. LOUIS AND KANSAS CITY)
DISTRIBUTION OF NORMAL SCHOOL TRAINING3
1st Class
High Schools
Sd <& 3d Class
High Schools
Total lst,2d<£3d
Class High Schools
Unclassified
High Schools
Men Women Both
%Qfn Of,.
Men Women Both
%OL OjL
Men Women Both
%(% Cf^
Men Women Both
%% <%
KlRKSVILLE
/o /o
25 #7 27
24 18 20
25 SU 25
16 f7 22
WARRENSBURG
36 hU 42
17 J+9 42
30 US 42
21 & 22
CAPE GIRARDEAU
19 9 11
20 n 14
19 10 12
37 IS 27
SPRINGFIELD
14 16 15
34 18 21
21 16 17
21 15.5 18
MARYVILLE
6 U 5
5 # 3
5 A 4
5 15.5 11
TOTAL
Ol^lOO (298)100 (389)100
(41)100 (1S$)100 (173)100
(132)100 (t*SO)10Q (562)100
(19)100 (26)100 (45)100
1 Includes three per cent who did secondary but no collegiate work at a normal school.
2 Figures in parenthesis indicate the total number on which the percentage is based.
8 Includes all secondary and collegiate work.
440
APPENDIX
TABLE 58. SUBJECTS TAUGHT BY MISSOURI HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS AND SUPERVISORS,
1916-171
FIRST CLASS SCHOOLS
One Subject Men
English 26 (5)3
Mathematics 61 (21)
History 37 (12)
Women
137 (9)
63 (3)
76 (2)
Both
163
114
113
Math., Histoiy & Science
Math., Sci. & Com. Subjects
Fifty-three other combinations
Sub-total
Men
5 (2)
5 (4)
36 (26)
95 (76)
Women
1
1*5(13}
85 (19)
Both
6
5
81
180
Household Arts
69
69
Four Subjects
Science
55
(10)
Ik
69
Six combinations
7
(6)
2
9
Commercial Subjects
29
(5)
38
67
Five Subjects
Manual Training
54
54
Two combinations
1
(1)
1
2
Music
9
S3
42
Teacher Training
Latin
27
9
(24)
(2)
IB
28
(1)
40
37
SECOND AND THIRD CLASS SCHOOLS
German
4
(2)
17
21
One Subject
Drawing
4
15
19
Household Arts
7
7
Physical Culture
10
7
17
Mathematics
2
(2)
I
6
Five other subjects 2
8
(3)
8
16
English
1
5
6
Sub-total
323
(84)
518 (.26)
841
History
2
(1)
It-
(1)
6
Latin
5
5
Two Subjects
Four other subjects
2
5
7
English & Latin
2
5%
(8)
54
Sub-total
7
(3)
SO
(jf)
37
English & History
6
(1)
IS
03)
54
Agriculture & Science
47
(33)
2
49
Two Subjects
Latin & German
3
37
(2)
40
English & History
13
(8)
uo
(9)
53
Mathematics & Science
26
(16)
0)
38
English & Latin
25
(8)
25
Mathematics & History
13
(10)
16
(3)
29
History & Agriculture
15
(13)
2
(1)
17
Mathematics & Latin
6
(3)
%1
(2)
27
Mathematics & History
6
(5)
6
(3)
12
History & Latin
7
(3)
19
(3)
26
English & Mathematics
2
(1)
12
(4)
14
English & Mathematics
2
20
(1)
22
Mathematics & Agriculture
8
(7)
8
English & German
15
co
15
Mathematics & Science
4
(3)
U
a)
8
English & Science
6
(3)
7
13
History & Latin
1
(1)
5
(s)
6
History & Agriculture
10
(10)
3
68)
13
Mathematics & Latin
1
(1)
5
(2}
6
History & German
1
1$
13
History & Science
4
(3)
1
6
History & Household Arts
n
12
Eighteen other combinations
10
(7)
18
a)
28
English & Teacher Training
is
12
Sub-total
64
(49)
118(35)
182
Mathematics & Agriculture
10
(9)
i
11
TJiree Subjects
Mathematics & Com Subjects
8
(4)
B
a)
11
Mathematics, Science & Agri.
32
(31)
1
33
Math. & Manual Training
1
(1)
9
(s)
10
English, History & Latin,
3
(2)
29 (
u»)
32
Agri. & Teacher Training
7
(5)
1
8
Math., Agriculture & History
24
(24)
1
25
English & Household Arts
8
8
English, Mathematics & Latin
3
(3)
9
(2)
12
History & Science
7
(5)
1
(1)
8
' History, Science & Agriculture
8
(8)
1
(1)
9
Mathematics & German
8
co
8
English, Math. & Agriculture
7
(7)
CO
9
Math. & Manual Training
8
(3)
8
Math., Agriculture & Latin
7
(7)
1
(i)
8
Teacher Training & History
4
(2)
3
7
English, Math. & Science
2
(1)
U
co
6
German & Teacher Training
6
a)
6
Mathematics, History & Latin
3
(3)
S
6
Math. & Household Arts
5
5
Mathematics, Science & Latin
2
(2)
S
a)
5
Fifty-six other combinations
30.
(12)
53
(s)
83
Forty-eight other combinations
34
(27)
09)
62
Sub-total
204 (120)
S86 (37)
590
Sub-total
125 (115)
82 (28)
207
Three Subjects
Four Subjects
Math., Science & Agriculture
31
(28)
6
(1)
37
Twenty-seven combinations
55
(52)
8
(5)
63
History, Science & Agriculture
13
(12)
2
(%)
15
History, Latin & German
English, Latin & German
3
(2)
11
8
(1)
11
11
Five Subjects
Eight combinations
58
(55)
7
(7),
65
English, Math. & History
8
8
Six Subjects
Math., History & Latin
2
(2)
U
(1)
6
Three combinations
4
(3)
4
1 Data are complete for all classified high schools in the state as given in the state high school directory for 1916-17.
3 Subjects or subject combinations offered by fewer than five teachers each are not listed.
8 Figures in parenthesis give the number of principals or superintendents teaching the subject. These are included
in the main figure.
J Oi O 00 CO 00 IO (
22 &
CO H
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§ §8§
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OOO
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OCJlQlOOl
< o o o
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<N 05 CO CN «O T-l
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t-T cT od o co c?
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ooo
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ioooooooSooooi
I O 0_ 0_ 0_ O C3 O C5 CS O 0_ 0_ <
"oioic5'o'o"o'o*'cft'(>i'c<fN'c4'c
NiHr-IC^C^OqSiHNCqoqtNC
g III §
j'yJoooor-TcJ'o'irJid
l-^OOOOCOiMtOt-O
OONOiNOOOO
OCOO1OOOOO
!oooooooS§Ng2<c^ooo
S^^iSSggS^!
8" s? f s s
T-l rl iH H rH <N
rt
I-l
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s
I
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lia
go o cst t» co o T-I <
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CO" Of r-T 10 US 09 10 r7 <
05 O
03 IO
iSSSSSSSSS
442 APPENDIX
§ VIII. THE JUDGMENT OF EXPERIENCED TEACHERS
As TO THE VALUE OF VARIOUS ELEMENTS IN THEIR TRAINING
IN order to discover, if possible, the judgment of experienced Missouri teachers as
to the elements in their preparation to which they were chiefly indebted, a list of
questions was sent to a group of teaching graduates both of the normal schools and
of the university. One hundred sixty-three responded,1 of whom thirty-six had taught
only in elementary schools, twenty-nine only in high schools, and ninety-five in both;
three gave no record of their service. The range of experience was from three to
twenty -five years, with a median of seven years. It seemed advisable to present all the
replies in one group. Except in certain respects, noted below, the reports from the
graduates of the university agreed approximately with those from the normal schools.
It should be remembered further that the training in either institution probably
varied quite as much at different periods as the form of training in the normal schools
differed from that in the university at any given time. Consequently only the most
general inferences may be drawn from the results.
In the following account the wording of the questionnaire is retained, but the order
of topics is that of the choice expressed in the replies.
I. Which kind of preparation has contributed more to your success as a teacher:
1. Preparation in various ways in the light of experience (91), or
2. Training received in normal school or college before taking a regular position (63)
NOTE: On this question the decision in favor of the first was reversed by the university graduates considered
alone to a majority of one in favor of the second. The votes at Maryville and Warrensburgwere tied.
II. Which group of courses has been of greater benefit to you:
1. Academic courses in subject-matter to be taught (95), or
2. Professional courses in the theory, history, and practice of education (63)
NOTE : Among votes from the university and from Kirksville the proportion was 3 to 1. Maryville alone reversed
the conclusion, 5-9.
III. Number the following courses in the order of their practical helpfulness in your present work:
Ranking (see Note)
1. Courses in special method in subjects you are teaching 1.805
2. Courses in general method or principles of teaching 1.664
3. Courses in psychology 1.591
4. Practice teaching with supervision 1.444
5. Courses in school administration 1.442
6. Courses in school management ' 1.351
7. Observation of teaching with discussion 1.270
8. Courses in particular city or state courses of study MS
9. Courses in history of education .168
10. Other professional courses .000
NOTE: See "The Technique of Combining Incomplete Judgments of the Relative Positions of N Facts made by
N Judges/'by Professor EX.Thorndike in the Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods, April
13, 1916, page 197. The column at the right expresses the distance in "Q" units of each subject from the lowest.
(See Thorndike's Mental and Social Measurements, Table 69.)
IV. Number the following possible elements of training as in III Banking
1. Self-criticism as a result of independent experience 3.711
£. Influence of example of particular teachers with whom you have studied 3. £52
3. Criticism from superintendents, principals, or other supervisors .
4. Books on teaching which you have read independently
5. Periodicals for teachers 1.210
6. Work in literary or debating societies , *981
7. Any other element especially important to you2 .640
8. Work in county institutes .000
1 The replies were distributed as follows among the different schools : Kirksville, 25 ; Warrensburg, 26 ; Cape Girar-
deau, 34; Springfield, 85; Maryville, 14; University of Missouri, 29.
2 Visiting schools, travel, school surveys, teachers associations, conferences with teachers or parents or pupils,
daily papers, club work, family traditions, outside interests.
RESULTS OF STANDARD TESTS 443
§IX. THE RESULTS OF STANDARD TESTS
IN THE ELEMENTARY TRAINING DEPARTMENTS OF MISSOURI STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS
AND IN THE EXPERIMENTAL SCHOOL1 AT THE STATE UNIVERSITY
THE tests employed aimed to measure the work done in reading, writing, arithmetic,
spelling, and composition, and were given in May, July, and October, 1 91 6. In order to
note the possible effect of giving the tests at different times of the year, the school at
Cape Girardeau, which was tested in May, was retested by another examiner in Octo-
ber, with similar results. It may be concluded, therefore, that neither the lapse of the
few months' time nor the possibility of opportunities for practice had any apprecia-
ble effect. In the tabulation of the results the pupils were listed in the grades in which
they were enrolled in May. The testing was done by five graduate students2 of the
Division of Education of Harvard University under the direction of Walter F. Dear-
born, professor of education at that university. Special care was given to the train-
ing of the examiners in order that the methods of conducting the tests might be uni-
form. In the dictation of words for spelling, and in one of the reading tests, the exam-
iners were assisted by selected teachers in the several schools.
The correcting and scoring of all the papers were done by two, and in some in-
stances by three, of the examiners. In those cases where the personal factor might
enter into the rating, every paper was scored independently by each of the readers.
The penmanship papers were graded by three of the examiners, who practised until
they had attained a high degree of uniformity in their judgments. After practice,
their final ratings fell within one step in terms of the Ayres scale. Similarly all of
the papers in composition were read by two of the examiners who had thru prac-
tice acquired an equal proficiency in rating the papers. When there were small dif-
ferences in the judgments, the average was taken. It is believed that many errors
which inevitably appear when the work of correcting is done by teachers and pupils
have been eliminated by having a limited number of trained readers for the work.
The skill and insight attained by the examiners thru practice is cumulative. The time
consumed in correcting is decreased, while the accuracy of the work is increased, and
the results are interpreted with greater discernment and uniformity.
All that these tests assume to do is to determine the attainments of the pupils in
the schools at the time the tests were given. It is quite possible that in some of the
classes the pupils are drawn from an inferior school population. It was stated in one
school, for example, that many of the pupils were recruited from a "floating "popu-
lation. Some of the classes were very small. In such classes it is of course possible to
have by mere chance relatively inferior or relatively superior groups. Some indica-
tion of the character of these classes has been secured from a study of the age-grade
distribution.
1 The experimental school at Columbia was included among the schools at which tests were given, because the in-
tention at the time was to publish the discussion of the preparation of teachers at the University of Missouri with
the present volume, and to include therewith a careful examination of this undertaking-. This proved not to be feas-
ible, as explained in the Introduction. It seemed unnecessary, however, on this account to omit the results of the
tests at Columbia, inasmuch as to do so would have required a reworking of a large portion of the material in
which the Columbia data had been included. It should be noted that this Institution is unlike the other schools, in
that it is not conducted as a training school for teachers, but for experimental purposes, with special reference to
the curriculum. On this basis, the pupils are not led to give their attention to the formal studies which are the sub-
jects of these tests. The results at Columbia should be interpreted, therefore, only in the light of the whole procedure
at that school.
2 Messrs. H. B, Cummings, L. P. Damon, E. A. Lincoln, C, A. Puckett, and E. A. Shaw.
444 APPENDIX
The results are stated In the tables in terms of the averages or medians, depend-
ing generally on the method of presenting standards in the studies with which it
is desired to make comparison. It has been found that even for the small number of
cases studied in these schools the median, which is secured with comparatively little
labor, is in close agreement with the average in nearly all cases. When this was not
the case, the median was usually more representative of the group than the average.
Several methods of comparing the relative standing qf the various schools and grades
have been employed. This has been necessary because of the small number of cases
involved in most of the comparisons, but also because of other considerations. The
average or median standing of the various grades has generally been used for inter-
grade comparisons; but, in the inter-school comparisons, since the work of the upper
grades is more representative of what the schools have accomplished than that of the
lower grades, the standing of the former grades may properly be given greater weight.
Since our tests of the eighth grades are sometimes incomplete, the average or median
standing of the sixth and seventh grades taken together has been secured for this
comparison.1
The maximum number of pupils tested is shown in Table 59 by schools and grades.
Because of absences, the number of papers obtained in any given test was often one
or two less than the number appearing in the table. Columbia has no eighth grade,
and, as there is no ninth grade at Maryville or Kirksville, no results for the eighth
grade could be obtained in the October testing of these schools. For these reasons
the results from the eighth grade have not been used in the inter-school compari-
sons, but are summarized for all the normal schools for the sake of comparisons with
standards or other records.
1 The above method of ranking did not always prove adequate to express all the facts, and in questionable cases
several other methods have been used. The supplementary methods employed are the following: (1) Upper Grade
Median Method ' Comparison of standing: of pupils in each grade with that of the pupils in the preceding- grade,
with special reference to the standing of the seventh grade as compared with that of the second or third grade.
Obviously, the efficiency of a school can be judged in part by the evidence of superior or inferior accomplishment
on the part of the later grades as compared with the earlier grades of the school. It is true that the attainments,
e.g., of an exceptional third grade when compared with an inferior eighth might seem to indicate that the school
had not accomplished much, and this possibility limits somewhat the usability of the method. The average age of
the pupils in such a third grade in comparison with the age of the pupils in the eighth grade may in some instances
explain this result. The method has, therefore, always been supplemented by a study of the age-grade relationships.
If, for example, the average age of the pupils in the various grades increases uniformly, but the relative attainments
of the pupils advance more rapidly, this can usually be taken as evidence of the superior efficiency of training
rather than as evidence of the mere maturity of the pupils. Some very striking evidence of the close relationship
between age and school attainment will appear in the tables. For the present it is enough to say that the relation-
ship seems so close that, when there is some irregularity in school progress, a reference to the age-grade table will
almost invariably explain the difference. The striking instances in this report of the relative superiority of a suc-
ceeding grade over a preceding one can in most cases be explained in this way. (2) Comparison in terms of the sum
of the relative ranks of the separate grades: By this method each of the grades is considered separately. For
example, the second grades of all the schools studied are ranked according to their relative standing in a given
test. Next, the third and the subsequent grades are handled in the same way. Then the relative standing of the
school as a whole is judged by the sum of the first, second, third, etc., ranks secured by the various grades. This
method has the advantage of giving weight to the attainments of the earlier grades, and thus it supplements the
first two methods which rate the schools chiefly on the basis of the attainments of the later grades. It should be
said, however, that it is a fair assumption that relative superiority in the earlier grades is likely to be indicative
of the selection of a superior group rather than excellence of school training ; but this is not always true. There-
fore, altho it is believed that the first two methods outlined above are on the whole better, it has seemed fair
to give some weight in judging the school as a whole to the accomplishments of the pupils of the earlier grades.
This method of comparison will be spoken of as the Rank-Sum method. (3) At times the best results are obtained
by a direct study of the distributions or frequency tables of the results of the tests. These give a record of each
individual score, and thus often throw considerable light on the above mentioned problems of comparison.
The tables show two rankings. The first of these is based on the scores of the combined sixth and seventh grades ;
the second and final ranking will take into consideration all the other methods of comparison above described.
RESULTS OF STANDARD TESTS 445
TABLE 59. NUMBER OF PUPILS BY SCHOOLS AND GRADES
Grade 2345678 Total
KIKKSVILLE 19 16 17 13 25 19 9 118
WARRENSBURG 15 21 15 20 21 41 32 165
CAPE GIRARDEAU 22 9 13 15 18 23 10 111
SPRINGFIELD 16 16 16 12 16 ,17 14 107
MARYVILLE 6 10 10 16 8 12 10 72
COLUMBIA IE 10 19 11 13_ J4 _0 -1£
Grade Totals 90 82 90 87 96 126 81 652
A study of the ages is important because of the light thrown on the question of
the mental calibre of the classes. Other things being equal, it is likely that a grade
composed of older pupils is an inferior grade, and, conversely, a grade composed of
younger pupils is likely to be a superior one. For valid comparisons, then, the me-
dian ages of the pupils in the grades, schools, or systems compared should be the
same. This condition is not fulfilled. The medians of the combined grades progress
regularly, and with equal deviations, beginning at 8 years in the second grade, and
TABLE 60. MEDIAN AGES OF PUPILS BY GRADES
Grade 234 56 78
KIRKSVILLE 81 19 9 16 10 17 12 13 12 25 13 19 14 9
(1) (1) (1) (1) (0) (0) (1)
WARRENSBURG 8 15 9 SI 9 15 11 20 11 21 13 LL 14 31
(0) (1) (1) (1) (1) (1) (1)
CAFE GIRARDEAU 8 22 99 10 IS 11 15 12 13 12 23 14 16
(0) (0) (1) (1) (1) (1) (1)
COLUMBIA 8 12 9 10 10 19 11 11 12 13 18. 1A —
(0) (1) (0) (1) (1) (1)
Grade Medians 8 90 9 52 10 89 n 87 12 \96 13 1*3 14^50
reaching 14 in the eighth. But in the separate schools this regularity is found only
in Columbia. The age problem may be handled in another way by studying the re-
tardation and acceleration of individuals in each grade. Tables 61 and 62 show the
findings on this basis. A pupil was considered retarded if he was two or more years
older than the group median age for his grade. He was considered accelerated if he
was two years younger than the grade median. In Kirksville, Maryville, and Warrens-
TABLE 61. NUMBER AND PEE. CENT OF PUPILS TWO OR MORE YEARS RETARDED
Grade 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 All Grades
No % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. %
KIRKSVILLE 4 21 16 424 323 624 15 222 21 19
WARRENSBURG 0 2 10 17 5 25 5 24 6 14 4 13 23 14
CAPE GIRARDEAU 0 0 0 3 20 3 23 14 3 19 10 9
SPRINGFIELD 0 0 0 0 0 0 1717
MARYVILLE 2 33 116 3 30 3 19 16 3 25 3 30 15 21
COLUMBIA 0 0 150 3 23 0 - 45
burg there is a fairly large amount of retardation throughout the grades. The first
two schools have retarded pupils in every grade, the latter in every grade but one.
In Cape Girardeau the retardation comes in the last four grades. In both Springfield
1 The first figure is the median age of the grade group; the figure in italics to the
children in the grade; and the figure below in parenthesis gives the median deviate
n °f
the grade median.
446 APPENDIX
and Columbia the retardation is negligible except in one grade. It is apparent that, ex-
cept in the case of Warrensburg, acceleration in these schools is not nearly so frequent
as retardation. Such as occurs is concentrated for the most part in one or two grades.
TABLE 62. NUMBER AND PEE CENT OF PUPILS TWO Oil MORE YEABS ACCELERATED
Grade 2 34 5 6 7 8 All Grades
No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. % No. %
KiRKSVILLE 0 0 1618280 0 44
WARRENSBURG 0 2 10 17 0 9 43 5 12 27 19 12
CAPE GIKARDEAU 0 0 18 17 18 4 17 2 12 98
SPRINGFIELD 16 16 16 19 0 17 0 55
MARYVILLE 0 0 0 160 2160 34
COLUMBIA 0 0 0 0 0 17— 11
To conclude : The study of the ages of pupils points out probable differences in the
mental make-up of the pupils in the different schools, and of pupils of the different
grades in the same school, which must be kept in mind when the results from the
various schools are compared.
1. Arithmetic Tests
Two series of tests were given in arithmetic: first, the Courtis Tests (Series B),1
and second, the Stone Reasoning Tests. The findings in the four fundamental pro-
cesses of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division are stated separately,
and a rank in all four of the processes combined has been attempted. It will be seen
from the table that the con-elation between the standings in the different tests is not
a perfect one. There is, however, a decided tendency for a school to hold approxi-
mately the same rank throughout the tests in both speed and accuracy, and for this
reason the final ranking is probably valid. A further ranking may be made by com-
bining the standings in speed and accuracy. In this Cape Girardeau stands first.
Springfield and Mary ville seem practically tied for the second place, but the higher
rank should probably go to the former school on the basis of greater accuracy in the
work. Warrensburg, Columbia, and Kirksville follow in the order named.
TABLE 63. SPEED OF ADDITION
Grade 3 4 6 6 7 8 6and7 combined Final
Score Rank Rarikz
KIRKSVILLE 44666-6 5.5
WARRENSBURG 3 5 6 6 8 - 7 2. 53
CAPE GIRARDEAU 34688- J 11
SPRINGFIELD 2 4 6 6 6 - 6 6 5. 5
MABYVIIXE 56678 -7 2.5 2
COLUMBIA 23576-654
All Schools 3466786
Courtis Standards 7 9 10 11 12
Small Cities3 7 8 9 10 10
1 The Courtis Tests (Series B) consist of a set of twenty-four examples for each of the operations in arithmetic : ad-
dition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. There is a definite time allotment for each set. In giving the test
each child is provided with a folder containing the four sets of examples, and is carefully instructed as to what he
is to do. At a signal from the tester, all the children begin work on the first set of examples, and they continue until
time is called. The same method of procedure is used for each set in turn. Between the second and third sets a short
rest period is given the children. The results are shown in terms of ** Speed " and " Accuracy" in accordance with
the more recent tables of Courtis, the former being the actual number of examples attempted within the required
time, and the latter the percentage of the number of attempts that were done correctly.
2 Courtis's General Tabulation, Small Cities, June, 1916.
8 It seems unnecessary in connection with each of the following tests to review all of the considerations by which
the final rank of the schools was determined. As an illustration of the process, however, the procedure in the pres-
RESULTS OF STANDAED TESTS
447
Grade
KlRKSVILLE
WARRENSBORG
CAPE GIRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
COLUMBIA
All Schools
Courtis Standards
Small Cities
0
0
0
0
25
0
TABLE 64. ACCURACY OF ADDITION
45678
25
25
20
25
67
0
20
64
60
20
38
43
50
50
50
40
70
68
38
33
60
50
44
73
71
50
50
67
64
40
60
50
75
72
50
76
74
6 and 7 combined
Score Rank
40
44
63
56
40 *
40
Mnal
Rank
Grade
KlRKSVILLE
WARRENSBURG
CAPE GIRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
COLUMBIA
All Schools 2
Courtis Standards
Small Cities
TABLE 65. SPEED OF SUBTRACTION
5678
5
5
8
8
9
6
6
10
10
12
11
10
13
12
6 and 7 combined
Score Rank
Final
Rank
5
6
6
7
4.5
4
S
2.5
2.5
8
2.5
2.5
9
1
1
7
4.5
5
Grade 3
TABLE 66. ACCURACY OF SUBTRACTION
6
8
6 and 7 combined
Score Rank
Final
Rank
KlRKSVILLE
0
WARRENSBURG
0
CAPE GIRARDEAU
0
SPRINGFIELD
25
MARYVILLE
0
COLUMBIA
0
All Schools
0
Courtis Standards
Small Cities
0
40
50
20
80
0
20
80
76
60
63
71
60
50
40
67
55
75
55
43
57
85
84
60
78
70
67
67
86
76
86
85
67
87
85
40
77
63
70
63
83
67
2
4.5
4.5
1
ent case is given in full. As may be seen from the table, Cape Girardeau leads with 8 examples attempted. Maryville
and Warrensburg are tied with 7 attempts each. The variability of the Warrensburg median is, however, twice as
great as that of Maryville, and since the latter school ranks decidedly superior to Warrensburg- by the Rank-Sura
method of comparison, it seems that Maryville should have the second place. In the table, Columbia, Kirksville, and
Springfield all rank the same, each having 6 attempts as a median in the combined sixth and seventh grades. From
an examination of the distributions it appears that Columbia should be ranked slightly ahead of the other two. The
results in Springfield are striking in that there is no progress after the fifth grade. This suggests the possibility of an
inferior seventh grade, -—a possibility which has already been indicated by the study of the age-grade distributions.
This school also has a smaller variability than Kirksville, but on the other hand, the Rank-Sum method shows that
they are not materially different. With all the above considerations in mind it seems that the ranking by the upper
grade medians should be modified slightly,and thatthefinal ranking should be as follows: (1) Cape Girardeau; (2)
Maryville ; (3) Warrensburg ; (4) Columbia ; (5) Springfield and Kirksville.
1 The inconsistency of this median is onlv apparent. Whenever one of the two grades used was much larger than
the other, a random selection was made from it, in order that all the combined grade medians might be based on
approximately the same number of cases. This method of random selections sometimes gave averages and medians
which do not seem to agree with the central tendencies of the separate grades. The method cannot, however, be
considered defective on this account, for there are many inconsistencies quite as great where no selection was used,
and furthermore the variations run so high that a difference of several points in the central tendency is quite in-
significant. These seeming inconsistencies occur in nearly all of the tables.
448
APPENDIX
Grade
TABLE 67. SPEED OF MULTIPLICATION
6
8
KlRKSVILLE 0
1
3
3
6
-
WARRENSBURG 0
3
6
5
7
-
CAPE GIRARDEAU 0
3
5
8
7
-
SPRINGFIELD 0
3
6
8
6
-
MARYVILLE 3
5
6
7
8
-
COLUMBIA 0
1
1
3
4
-
All Schools 0
2
5
5
6
9
Courtis Standards
6
8
9
10
12
Small Cities
6
8
9
10
11
6 and 7 combined
Score
4
Rank
5.5
3.5
1.5
3.5
1.5
5.5
Final
Rank
5
3.5
2
3.5
1
6
Grade
TABLE 68. ACCURACY OF MULTIPLICATION
45678
6 and 7 combined
Score Rank
Final
Rank
KlRKSVILLE 0
0
25
0
33
-
WARRENSBURG 0
0
50
50
60
-
CAPE GIRARDEAU 0
0
67
63
75
-
SPRINGFIELD 0
0
80
67
57
-
MARYVILLE 0
26
75
50
50
-
COLUMBIA 0
0
0
0
57
-
All Schools 0
0
50
50
50
70
Courtis Standards
67
75
78
80
81
Small Cities
68
76
79
80
81
20
50
67
60
50
S3
60
3.5
1
2
3.5
6
3.5
1
2
3.5
6
Grade 3
TABLE 69. SPEED OF DIVISION
5678
KlRKSVILLE
0
1
2
3
4
-
WAKRENSBURG
0
2
5
4
6
-
CAPE GIRARDEAU
0
1
4
5
5
-
SPRINGFIELD
0
2
3
6
5
-
MARYVILLE
0
3
4
5
6
_
COLUMBIA
0
0
1
2
5
-
All Schools
0
1
4
4
5
8
Courtis Standards
5
6
8
10
11
Small Cities
5
6
8
10
10
6 and 7 combined
Score
3
5
5
6
6
3
Rank
5.5
3.5
8.5
1.5
1.5
5.5
Final
Rank
6
8
4
2
1
5
Grade 3
TABLE 70. ACCURACY OF DIVISION
6678
6 and 7 combined
Score Rank
Mnal
Rank
KlRKSVILLE 0
0
0
33
60
-
WARRENSBURG 0
0
60
67
80
-
CAPE GIRAKDEAU 0
0
33
75
80
_
SPRINGFIELD 0
0
67
71
75
-
MARYVILLE 0
60
67
60
60
-
COLUMBIA 0
0
0
50
60
-
All Schools 0
0
50
67
71
75
Courtis Standards
57
77
87
90
91
Small Cities
59
77
87
91
93
71
60
60
67
2
1
3
4.5
4.5
2
1
3
.4
5
1 See page 447, note 1.
RESULTS OF STANDARD TESTS 449
TABLE 71. COMPARISON OF BANKS IN COURTIS TESTS1
Pour Operations
School Addition Subtraction Multiplication Division Combined
S2A3SA S A SA SA
KIRKSVILLE 5.5 6 66 56 66 66
WARRENSBURG 33 42 35 3.5 32 43
CAPE GIRARDEAU 11 2.5 4 21 41 21
SPRINGFIELD 5.5 2 25 3 3.5 2 23 32
MARYVILLE 25 15 13-5 14 14
COLUMBIA 44 51 65 55 *55
TABLE 73. MEDIAN SCORES IN STONE REASONING TEST3
Grade 3 4 56 786 and 7 combined Final
Score Rank Bank
KIRKSVILLE 0.0 1.0 1.0 4.0 52 - 5.0 4.5 5.5
WARRENSBURG 0.0 1.0 2.0 3.6 5.6 - 4.4 6 5.5
CAPE GIRARDEAU 1.0 2 0 3.0 5.0 7.1 6.6 1 1
SPRINGFIELD 1.0 2.0 3.6 4.6 6.8 5.8 2 2
MARYVILLE 00 0.5 31 4.0 6.7 5.4 3 3
COLUMBIA 1.0 2.5 4.6 4.6 5.0 - 5.0 4.5 4
All Schools 1.0 1.6 3.0 4.0 6.4 7.0 5.2
Starch Standards* 4.5 6.2 7.8 9.4 11.0 12.6
Three Cities5 3.1 5.0 7.3 8.9
Boston 4.4 < 56 7.6
£. Spelling Tests
For these tests thirty words were selected for each grade. Twenty of these were taken
from the Ayres Spelling Scale, and the other ten from the Boston Minimum Lists.6
TABLE 73. SPELLING OF WORDS FROM THE AYRES LIST
Grade 2 34 56 786 and 7 combined Final
Score Hank Hank
KIRKSVILLE 67 66 53 73 64 58 - 61 6 6
WARRENSBURG 82 65 58 76 79 71 - 74 4 4
CAPE GIRARDEAU 76 84 82 85 80 83 - 80 1.6 2
SPRINGFIELD 95 85 72 89 81 79 - 80 1.5 1
MARYVILLE 97 93 73 80 76 76 75 T 3 3
COLUMBIA Not given €0 57 66 67 76 - 72 5 5
All Schools 81 74 64 78 74 73 77 76 7
Ayres Standard8 77 77 76 76 76 76 76
1 For graphic comparisons of the median scores in Missouri training schools with Courtis standards, see Table 84.
2 8= Speed. A= Accuracy.
8 In this test the pupils are given a folder which contains twelve problems of graded difficulty. Exactly fifteen min-
utes are allowed the pupils in which to work as many problems as they can. A certain problem value, as determined
by the author of the tests, is credited for each correct answer. The pupil's score in the test is obtained by adding
all the credits which he receives.
* Based on results from 2515 pupils in 18 schools.
5 The average of the medians secured at Butte, Montana ; Laporte, Indiana; and Salt Lake City, Utah,
6The words were not given by the examiners, butwere dictated by the regular gradeor practice teacher. This was
deemed advisable because of the fact that the pupils were more familiar with the voice and enunciation ot tne
teacher In correcting the papers credit was given for accepted forms of simplified spelling, and for wrong words,
evidently misunderstood, which were correctly spelled. Tt should be noted In this test that progress thru the
grades is not made by getting a higher score on the same words, but by maintaining the same score (79) on lists
of words of increasing difficulty. The comparisons are made In terms of averages instead of medians because tne
standards are so stated.
7 See page 447, note 1. 8 Average of 84 cities.
450
APPENDIX
TABLE 74. SPELLING OF WORDS FROM THE BOSTON LIST1
Grade
KlRKSVILLE
WARRENSBURG
CAPE GIRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
COLUMBIA
36
57
73
All Schools
Brooklme, Mass.3
57
33
47
61
Not given 38
50
29
31
66
71
38
28
42
61
5
65
57
71
57
35
68
69
39
60
55
74
59
53
55
84
33
43
62
50
37
36
45
57
80
6 and 7 combined
Score Rank
Final
Rank
33
6
6
52
3
3
63 »
1
2
62
2
1
42
5
4
44
4
5
8. Penmanship Tests
The tests in penmanship were arranged by Professor Henry W. Holmes of Harvard
University,, and were used with his permission. Records for comparison with the pres-
ent results were made available thru his courtesy.
The ranking of the different schools is practically the same in both tests given. For
efficiency in writing a proper balance must evidently be maintained between speed
and quality; that is, neither speed nor quality of writing can be bettered at the ex-
pense of the other. By taking both factors into consideration, the Warrensburg school
stands first in the ranking. It has the best writing from the standpoint of quality
combined with fair speed. Cape Girardeau and Columbia come next, and Springfield,
Maryville, and Kirksville follow in the order named.
TABLE 75. SPEED OF HANDWRITING*
Grade 2
KIRKSVILLE
SI
WARRENSBURG
45
CAPE GIRARDEAU
38
SPRINGFIELD
44
MARYVILLE
39
COLUMBIA
35
All Schools
40
St. Louis5
37
Newton, Mass.
39
Brooklme, Mass.
(1236 pupils)
44
66
69
64
32
49
57
55
59
60
75
75
51
51
62
64
59
79
100
97
55
87
80
66
73
76
83
82
112
110
83
89
92
69
85
87
71
92
111
93
92
75
94
90
102
73
102
0 and 7 combined
Score Rank
Final
Rank
79
6
6
87
4
8.5
111
1
1
104
2
2
83
5
5
89
3
3.5
93 a
1 The relative standings of the schools in the spelling of words from the Boston list is shown in the above table.
The reason for the lower scores on the Boston list is that the words are much more difficult than those of the Ayres
list.
2 See page 447, note 1.
z Boston standards for these words range from 86 per cent to 95 per cent, but only after the words have been studied
for one or two lessons. The conditions in Brookline, Mass., were the same as in Missouri.
*The Holmes Test for the Speed of Writing is given as follows: A short sentence is written on the board by the
examiner and copied by the children at the top of their papers. After the directions for the test have been given,
the sentence is read in concert by the class several times, so that it is fairly well learned before the test begins, and
little or no time is lost by the pupils because of forgotten copy. After two short practice periods of 15 seconds each,
which are given for the purpose of "warming up," the sentence is written repeatedly for a one minute and a four
minute period. The number of letters written per minute in each period is found, and the average of these is taken
as the pupils' speed of writing.
The sentence is: ** Jolly kings bring gifts while happy maids dance." It will be noticed that this sentence con-
tains most of the letters and the common letter combinations.
6 The Holmes material was not used in this test.
RESULTS OF STANDARD TESTS
451
Grade
TABLE 76. QUALITY OF HANDWRITING1
678
KlRKSVILLE
35
32
39
36
38
35
WARRENSBURG
35
39
43
48
47
51
CAPE GIRARDEAO
33
36
43
39
42
47
SPRINGFIELD
34
29
33
36
43
40
MARYVILLE
32
41
38
43
45
37
COLUMBIA
50
42
46
43
44
49
All Schools
35
36
39
41
42
45
Kansas City2
30
36
42
50
54
56
St. Louis2
30
32
37
49
57
63
Newton, Mass.
54
50
45
48
51
50
Starch Standards 2
27
33
37
43
47
53
South Bend Standards2
40
40
50
50
60
47
74
53
67
60
6 and 7 combined Final
Score Rank Bank
6 6
1
37
51
42
41
44
47
1
3
4.5
4.5
2
4. Reading Tests
The reading tests were four in number: the Kansas Silent Reading Test and Pro-
fessor Holmes's three tests (a) for speed in silent reading, (b) in reproducing a pas-
sage read, and (c) in answering questions on a passage read.
TABLE 77. KANSAS SILENT READING TESTS8
Grade.
KlRKSVILLfi
5.2
WARRENSBURG
30.3
CAPE GIRARDEAU
18.1
SPRINGFIELD
10.5
MARYVILLE
7.2
COLUMBIA
6.8
All Schools
8,5
Scores in 19 Cities4
6.0
Western States
6.1
9.8
10.3
16.3
13.4
8,5
12.4
124
9.9
10.6
12.8
125
23.8
183
14.6
16.3
16.3
13.7
144
16.8
12.9
106
13.5
11.7
15.4
13.2
13.4
15.0
19.3
20.1
300
17.3
15.8
16.3
20.0
16.5
18.0
6 and 7 combined
Score Bank
18.4
16.7
19.7
1S.9
12.8
18.4
18.8
20.6
15.4
16.2
Final
Rank
2
3
1
5
1The Holmes Test for the Quality of Writing prorides for the rating on the Ayres Scale of three samples of the
pupils' penmanship. The average of these three ratings is taken as the final score.
The first of the three samples rated was the paper written in the four minute speed test; the second, a short story
written by the pupils from dictation, and the third the " reproduction " paper from the reading test. In the latter
case the pupils did not know that the paper was to be graded for penmanship. Each of the papers was rated inde-
pendently by two of the examiners, and the two ratings were averaged for the score of the paper.
2 The test given in this case was not the Holmes test, but the writing was rated on the Ayres Scale.
3 The purpose of this test is to determine "the ability of pupils to get meaning from the printed page." It consists
of a series of "exercises," in the form of short paragraphs, in which the child is given certain directions to follow
or in which he is required to solve a simple problem. Each exercise is so arranged that the response of the child is
either right or wrong. A folder containing a set of these exercises is given to each child in the class, and all begin
to work at a signal from the examiner. The score is determined by the number of exercises which are completed in
five minutes, the weighting of each exercise in the final score having been calculated by the author of the tests.
The median scores obtained are recorded in the table. The slight decrease in the scores of the sixth grade is due to
the fact that two sets of exercises are used, one set for the third, fourth, and fifth, and another for the sixth, seventh,
and eighth grades.
* For 7729 pupils.
APPENDIX
TABLE 78. SPEED OF SILENT READING1
Grade
KIRKS VILLE
WARRENSBURG
CAPE GIRARDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
COLUMBIA
All Schools
Brookhne, Mass,
(1251 pupils)
2
3
- 4
5
6
7
8
6 arid 7 combined
Score Rank
Final
Bank
126
207
180
321
264
276
-
264
5
5
141
180
147
299
249
309
-
276
4
4
147
384
237
222
234
463
-
321
2
2
138
237
188
364
276
237
-
249
6
6
180
180
405
363
363
291
-
309
3
3
186
147
219
309
327
324
-
324
I
1
147
198
198
809
276
318
363
»
249
283
309
294
TABLE 79. REPRODUCTION OF PASSAGE READ
Grade
KlRKSVILLE
11
43
WARRENSBURG
14
29
CAPE GIRARDEAU
14
66
SPRINGFIELD
26
49
MARYVILLE
41
29
COLUMBIA
29
37
All Schools
20
37
Brooklifle, Mass.
(1224 pupils)
4
40
43
60
54
43
29
51
51
63
49
51
57
51
57
51
63
57
57
49
54
57
63
57
69
54
57
57
60
57
60
60
6 and 7 combined
Score Rank
Final
Rank
63
2
ii
54
5
5
69
1
1
57
3.5
8.5
57
8.5
3.5
49
6
6
57
TABLE 80. ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS ON PASSAGE READ
Grade
8
6 and 7 combined
/Score Sank
KlRKSVILLE
19
39
49
64
69
68
-
WARRENSBURG
19
44
44
72
68
68
-
CAPE GIRARDEAU
39
71
77
73
77
85
-
SPRINGFIELD
38
59
68
77
78
77
-
MARYVILLE
44
49
54
69
72
69
-
COLUMBIA
53
53
44
68
70
73
-
All Schools
37
50
52
69
72
72
75
Brookline, Mass.
62
64
68
73
(1252 pupils)
69
68
82
77
72
70
73 3
Final
JKank
5.6
5.5
1
2
3.5
8.5
5. Composition Test
For this test the pupils of the seventh and eighth grades were asked to write a
composition on any one of three assigned subjects. The topics given were such that
the pupil had a fairly wide range of choice, while the product was kept fairly uniform.
The compositions were graded by the Harvard-Newton Composition Scale.
1 For this and the two following tests the pupils are given slips of paper on which is printed a simple story, and a
period of twenty seconds is allowed for reading. When the signal to stop is given, each child makes a mark under
the word which he is reading, and then finishes the leading of the story. When all are done, the class is asked to
reproduce the story in writing. Finally, a set of questions on the mam points of the story is given, and the pupils
are asked to write the answers. The speed of silent reading is scored in the number of words read per minute ; the
reproduction is scored according to the number of ideas which are correctly reproduced by the pupil, and the an-
swers to the questions according to definite values assigned them. The grade scores are the averages of the indi-
vidual scores. Before giving this test a similar test was first practised to familiarize the children with the mechanics
of the operation.
2 See page 447, note 1.
RESULTS OF STANDARD TESTS
453
School
KIRKSVILLE
WARRENSBUE.G
CAP% GlRAUDEAU
SPRINGFIELD
MARYVILLE
COLUMBIA
All Schools
Blooming-ton, Ind.2
(268 pupils)
TABLE 81. COMPOSITIONS
Grade 7 Grade 8
64 72
57
74
75
67
70
67
61
65
75
75
70
67
Final Bank
45
6
1
2
4.5
3
6. Final Ranking of the Schools
By way of summarizing the inter-school comparisons, a final ranking of the schools
on the basis of the results in all the tests has been made. The tables show that Cape
Girardeau easily ranks first. This school stands either first or second in all but three
of the tests. Springfield stands second, while Maryville and Warrensburg are about
tied for third place, with the advantage slightly in favor of the former. Columbia
comes fifth, and Kirksville last — considerably below the other schools.
The relative standing of the schools is not, however, the most significant thing
that the results of the tests show. Of much greater importance is the fact of the wide
variation between these schools. Altho in practically every test there are two or
more schools in which the attainments are very close, yet in every test the difference
between the highest and the lowest score is considerable. It does not seem that such
variations should exist between schools which are engaged in similar work. Since it is
unlikely that the selection of pupils or their general intelligence is sufficiently differ-
ent in the various schools to produce such results, the explanation must be looked for
in differences in the quality and amount of school training.
TABLE 82. SUMMARY OF RANKS GIVEN EACH SCHOOL
Arithmetic Tests
Spelling
Penman-
ship
Reading and
Composition
5s>
a
g,
•e
§
1
1
*>
*8
1
1
o
1
i
US
1
§,
8
I
|
.§
o
1
o
£
CO
CO
fl
'42
vy
i
i
•2
"S»
•3
1
i
"I
3
5
1
eg
£
&
§
i
1
I
|
1
1
•fa
1
1
S
1
1
ts
•1*
1
1
o
j.
I
1
O
Wl
"3
^
13
1
1
"§
1
.1
1
1
^
1
I
I
1
I
I
6
1
1
KTRKSVXLLE
5.5
6
6
6
5
6
6
6
5.5
6
6
6
6
2
5
2
5.5
45
95
6
WARRENSBURG
3
3
4
2
3.5
3.5
3
2
5.5
4
3
3.5
1
3
4
5
5.5
6
64.5
4
CAPE GIRARDEAU
1
1
2.5
4
2
1
4
1
1
2
2
1
3
1
2
1
1
1
31.5
1
SPRINGFIELD
55
2
2.5
3
3.5
2
2
3
2
1
1
2
4.5
5
6
3.5
2
2
52.5
2
MARYVILLE
2
5
1
5
1
3.5
1
4
3
3
4
6
4.5
6
3
3.6
3.5
4.5
62.5
3
COLUMBIA
4
4
5
I
6
5
5
5
4
5
5
3.5
2
4
1
6
3.5
3
72
5
xThe comparisons in this test are based on the scores of the seventh grades alone because there Is no eighth grade
in Columbia, and the scores for the eighth grades at Kirksville and Maryville are based on so few cases as to be
unreliable.
2 These medians were found by combining the scores of the A and B divisions of the grades in Bloomington. See Jte-
jport of Second Indiana Conference on Educational Measurements, page 117 if.
454 APPENDIX
7. Progress in the Schools
The efficiency of a school may be judged, in part, at least? by the advance in the
various subjects which the pupils of the school make from grade to grade. This was
one of the methods used above to estimate the rank of a school. It should always be
kept In mind9 however, that the progress shown below is not that of the same pu-
pils, but that of the school as a whole. The records simply tell how much superior
the standing of the pupils in one grade is to that of the pupils in some preceding
grade in the same school, and this line of progress in any one school may be easily
disturbed if any grade be above or below its normal standard. In the schools as a
group such irregularities are likely to be smoothed out. This uniformity in the pro-
gress from grade to grade is an important element in the comparison. There may
be a regular advance in each grade, or all the gains may be made in one or two grades
with little or no gain in the other grades. Grading of pupils and the outlining of
courses of study is done, for the most part, in the belief that regular and uniform
progress is the rule. It was not considered necessary to make diagrams for all the tests;
the seven given in Table 83 indicate clearly the general situation.
The progress lines for all the schools taken together are shown at the right of the
diagram. They indicate, for the most part, a steady and gradual gain in the average
attainments of the pupils from the second to the eighth grade. In many cases the
lines do not rise as rapidly after the sixth grade as they do before this grade. This
is what we should expect, because intensive drill in the formal subjects is about fin-
ished by the end of the sixth grade. There is one noticeable exception to the general
regularity of improvement. In several of the tests the scores of the fifth grade are as
high or higher than the scores of the sixth grade. This is especially noticeable in the
speed of silent reading, and in the speed of addition. There is a slight improvement
in the accuracy of addition.
The progress lines in the several schools again bring out the fact that there are
many inter-school differences, as well as inequalities in the same school and grade in
the standing of the pupils in the various subjects of study. Altho there are many cases
of regular and continued progress thru the grades, the ups and downs in the records
show altogether too frequently that grade standards are lacking. Some of the irregu-
larities are doubtless to be explained by the limitation already mentioned, namely, that
the progress has not been measured by the attainments of the same groups of pupils in
successive years ; but the fact still remains that, in many instances, grade position gives
little or no indication of the character of work or the attainments of the pupils.
8. Correlations
A few of the possible correlations among the abilities measured in the tests have
been worked out, and are given in Table 85 :l
1 Most of these correlations were calculated by the Spearman " foot-rule " formula and were then translated into
the equivalent coefficients of correlation of the Pearson method. (See Table 37, pagre 169, of Thorndike's Mental and
Social Measurements.) Since there is some question concerning1 the reliability of this method of calculation, a num-
ber of the correlations were also obtained by the usual Pearson formula as a check on the results. The results by the
two methods were in sufficient agreement to justify the use of the shorter method alone in the remaining correla-
tions.
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INDEX
INDEX
.ACADEMIC courses In normal schools, 228 if.;
how professionalized, 148 ff., 227, 231.
Academic subjects, Teachers of, in normal
schools, 283 ; salaries of, 284, 424.
Academies : in Missouri, charter of Ste. Gene-
vieve, 19; preparation of teachers in
(1831), 30; report on (1840), 30; versus nor-
mal schools for preparation of teachers
(1831-70), 30 ff.
Administration, Normal school : effects of pro-
posed reorganization, 57 f.; of curricula,
258 ff.; presidents' powers and duties in,
273; of teaching staff, 276 fF.; of students,
292 ff.; in summer session, 290 ff.; influence
of, on students, 353 f., 397 ; tone of , 354 ;
conclusions regarding, 396.
Administration, State educational : development
of state unit, 63; principle of centralization
in, 63; purposes of, 63; reorganization of,
63 ff, 67 ff.; conditions of successful, 64;
should replace legislative detail, 64 ; special
concern with teachers, 64; state superin-
tendent, 65; need of unified control, 65,
349; experiments in Massachusetts, Wis-
consin, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Montana,
65 f . ; teacher supply the chief problem of,
65 ; control by single board, 67 ; relation of
executives, 68; certification of teachers,
347 f. ; conclusions regarding, 388 ff.
Administration, Training- for, 153, 159.
Administrative policies of proposed Board of
Education, 390.
Admission to normal schools : standards of,
128 ff.; effects of unregulated attendance,
302 ff. ; early requirements for, 307 ; pledge
to teach, 307; age limits, 307; examination
for, 308; "proving up," 308; uniform ad-
ministration needed, 311 f.; indispensable
conditions, 312 f.; state department the
appropriate agent for, 312; original creden-
tials necessary, 313; conclusions regarding,
391,396.
Adviser, Educational, proposed for normal
schools, 255 f.
Advisers, Student, at Kirksville, 314 ; at Cape
Girardeau, 314, note 3.
Age : of students in normal schools, 117, Table
26, p. 429 ; of teachers in normal schools,
99, Table 5, p. 419.
Agreement: of normal schools (1904) : curricu-
lum provisions of, 87 f., 309; attitude of
Kirksville toward, 309, 312.
of normal schools (1914): curriculum provi-
sions of, 162.
of normal school Conference (1916) : nature
and promise of, 61 f., 387 ; curriculum provi-
sions of, 164 f., 173; qualifications of teach-
ers, 104 f.
Agriculture: courses in, 240 if., Tables 1, 2,
pp. 409, 411 ; teachers of, 282 f.
Albany, State normal school established at, 31.
Ancient languages, 232 : amount and variety of,
232 if.; enthusiasm of teachers for, 233;
courses in, Tables 1, 2, pp. 4O6, 411.
Appointment : of normal school teachers, 280 ;
of normal school graduates, 349: present
procedure in, 350 ; demand yet un special-
ized, 350; candidates too little studied, 351 f. ;
normal schools responsible for appoint-
ments, 351 ; and for teachers in service, 352 ;
conclusions on, 396.
Apprentice system, of practice teaching : at St.
Louis, 202 ff.; need for, in state at large,
349; possible thru unified control, 349.
Arithmetic: collegiate course in, 150; in sec-
ondary curricula, 164; tests of training
schools in, 446 ff.
Art and science of teaching in early normal
schools, 29, 32 f.
Attendance: at normal schools: local nature of,
118 f.; at Harris Teachers College, 125; by
men, motives and effects of, 292 ; of second-
ary students, 295 f.; problem of, 301 ff.;
effects of present procedure, 302 f. ; conti-
nuity possible and necessary, 304 f. ; favor-
able legislation needed, 305; unified ad-
ministration needed, 305; normal schools
partly responsible, 306; desire of students
for continuity, 306; regulation of summer
session, 306; conclusions concerning, 396;
in students' families, 118, Table 34, p. 432;
at schools of Missouri, average number of
days, 20.
Ava, High school at, 299.
Ay res spelling scale, 449.
BABCOCK, Kendrick C., 101.
Bache, Alexander D. , on preparation of teach-
ers (1839), 26.
Bachelor of Arts, Degree of, in Missouri normal
schools, 37, 344.
Bachelor of Science in Education, Degree of,
344.
Bachelor degrees (four-year) from Missouri
normal schools, Table 48, p. 437.
Bagley, William C., 5, 404.
Baldwin, Joseph : life and character, 35 ; estab-
lishes normal school at Kirksville, 34 ; urges
unified policy for normal schools, 44 ; work
in state at large, 84; plan of degrees at
Kirksville, 344.
Ballard, Edward, on preparation of teachers
(1862), p. 81.
Baptist colleges in Missouri, 19.
Barnard, Henry, in Connecticut, 29 ; in Wiscon-
sin, 31.
460
INDEX
Beckedorff, L,, aids teacher-training in Ger-
many (1827), 27.
Bell-Lancaster schools, 187,
Biology : lacking in Missouri normal schools,
£39 ; importance of, 339; courses in (1917-
18), Tables 1, 2, pp. 408, 4.11.
Board of Curators : relations with professional
board of executives, 57; possible use as
board of education, 388, note 1 ; transfer
of powers to proposed board of education,
390.
Board of Education, State : Missouri ex-officAo,
42; reorganization of, in Missouri, 03 ff.,
388 ff.; proposed composition and duties,
388 1; proposed administrative policies,
390 f.; in Massachusetts, 65; in Wisconsin,
65; in Illinois, 65; in Iowa, 66; in Kansas,
66 ; in Montana, 66 1; function of, 69.
Boards of Regents : single board at first, 42 ;
objections to single board, 42 ; single board
opposed by teachers, 43 ; separate boards
established, 43 ; non-partisan provisions,
43 ; contemporary criticism of separate
boards, 43; present operation of, 44 ff.;
function of, 45 f.; rapid changes in member-
ship, 45 ; politics in, 47 ; weakness both in
material and educational problems, 48 f.;
diversity of procedure under, 49 ; lack of
unity in state policies, 49; summary of de-
fects, 53 f.; advantage of, 54; proposals to
replace with unified control, 54 ff. , 65, 388 1 ;
effects of proposed reorganization, 57 ff.;
voluntary cooperation of normal schools
under, 61 f . ; effect of local control on nor-
mal school, 75; appointment of teachers by,
280; powers transferred to proposed board
of education, 390.
Bonus credit: at Cape Girardeau, 319 f.; at the
University of Missouri, 360,
Botany, Courses in, 239, Table 1, p. 408.
Brooks, Charles : efforts for preparation of teach-
ers (1834-39), pp. £5, 28; on origin of nor-
mal schools, 26.
Boston minimum spelling lists, 449 f.
CADET system of practice teaching, ^Appren-
tice system.
California, proportion of secondary school at-
tendance, 20.
Carnegie Foundation ; bulletins of, xvi ; purpose
of, in present study, xvi; provisional curri-
cula published by, 194,
Carter, James G.: on preparation of teachers
(1824-39), 24; petitions legislature of
Massachusetts for funds, 24; opens semi-
nary at Lancaster (1897), 24 ; elected to le-
gislature (1835), 28 ; secures board of educa-
tion for Massachusetts (1837), 28; advocates
normal schools, 28.
Calendar of Missouri normal schools, Develop-
ment of, 301,
Cape Girardeau, Normal school at: establish-
ment of, 34 f.; location of, 36; growth in
numbers, 37 ; cost of first building, 38 ; se-
cures separate board, 42 ; stability of board,
45; board of regents at, 47 ; housing of, 49;
seeks to become a liberal arts college, 72,
79, 260, note; influence of local interests at,
79; function of president at, 274, note.
Teachers at: data from, 402; training of,
101 1, Table 8, p. 420; salaries of, Table 15,
p. 423 ; salaries in department of education,
284; salaries by departments, Table 16\ p.
424; programs of, 108, Table IT, p. 425; ex-
tent of secondary work, Table 19, p. 425;
policy toward part-time, 286; summer in-
structors (1916), training, salaries, and pro-
grams, 2S9, Tables 20, 21, pp. 426, 427.
Students at: data from, 403 f.; classified stu-
dent enrolment, Table 22 A, p. 428; "stan-
dard" enrolment, Table 22 B, p. 428; policy
toward male attendance, 204; proportion of
men, Table 23, p. 428; secondary enrol-
ment, Table 25, p. 429; nationality of par-
ents, 117, Table 27, p. 429; occupation of
father, Table 28, p. 430; income of father,
Table 29, p. 431 ; size of family, Table 32,
p, 431; other teachers in family. Table 33,
p. 432,- normal school attendance of family,
Table 34, p. 432; high school attendance,
Table 35, p. 432; ratings of students pre-
pared at normal schools and at high schools,
Table 37, p. 433; teaching experience of,
Table 38, p. 433; examinations for admis-
sion abandoned, 310, note 4; programs of,
298, 318 1, 330, Tables 42, 43, pp. 434 f.;
size of classes, Table 46, p. 436; method of
classification, 316; secondary versus col-
legiate classification, 317, note £; grades of
(1913-14), Table 44, p. 435; records of,
3371; administration of credit, 89, 3371;
effect of irregular attendance on sequence,
303; opinion of teachers on irregular at-
tendance, 306.
Curriculum: election of professional studies,
168, note 2; course in rural life problems,
175, note 2$ ancient languages, 232; mod-
ern foreign languages, 234; commercial
subjects, 2431; manual arts, £45; library
economy, 246; physical training, 247; list
of all collegiate courses, Tables 1, 0, pp.
406-411; practice facilities at, 195.
Training school; housing and equipment of,
197; organization of, 201; lesson plans, 216;
conferences of practice teachers, 218; pro-
gram of studies, 220; tests of training
school, 2091, 443 ff.; arithmetic, 446 if.,
455; spelling, 4491; penmanship, 4501;
reading, 4511; composition, 453; final
rank, 453; progress in selected abilities,
4541; selected correlations, 451., 456,
Product of: in teaching population: rural
teachers, 362; graded elementary teach-
ers, 3651, Tables 51-55, pp. 4381; high
school teachers, 374, Tables 56, 57, p. 439;
city and town superintendents, 378 1 ;
county superintendents, 380, note; bache-
INDEX
lor's degrees from, Table 48, p. 437; em-
ployment of graduates of (1915), Table
49, pp. 437 f.; judgments of graduates as to
training, 442.
Centralization of state educational control, 63.
Certificates: held by rural teachers (1915), £66;
needed restrictions in, 269 ; third grade,
305, 363; normal school (1915), employ-
ment of recipients, 437 f.
Certification : right of, acquired by normal
schools, 345 ; nature of present, 345 ; ob-
jections to present form of, 346 ; should be
specific, 346 ; should not be fixed by statute,
347 ; a single authority for, 347 ; function
of state superintendent in, 348 ; share of the
institutions in, 348; demands a unified
administration, 349, 363; conclusions on,
396.
Chancellor of the university, Proposed, 68,
388 f.; duties of, 389.
Changes since 1915, 6; in normal school admin-
istration, 354 ff. ; in salaries of teachers, 383,
note.
Chemistry for teachers, 153.
Chemistry, Courses in, 238, Tables 1,2, pp. 408,
411.
Cheney, L. H., urges unified policy in normal
schools (1875), 44.
Christian Brethren, 186.
Classes of institutions granting degrees to teach-
ers in normal schools, in the Soldan High
School, St. Louis, and in the University of
Missouri, 101 f,? Table 8 B, p. 420.
Classes in normal schools: size of, 258, 264,
Tables 46, 47, pp. 436 f.; duplication of,
258 f.; composition of, 314 f., 403.
Classification of students in normal schools,
313 ff.; indefinite character of, 313; theory
of "dropped students," 314, note 1, 322,
note 2; procedure at Kirksville and its re-
sults, 314 f.; procedure 0sewhere, 31 6; opin-
ions of teachers on, 317, note 1; fixed curri-
cula the solution, 316.
Clinton, Governor De Witt, and preparation of
teachers, 30.
Coleman, W. E,, on normal schools, 39.
Collection and treatment of data, 401 ff.
Colleges of Education, a substitute for normal
schools, 12, 55 f.
Colleges of Missouri visited, 6.
Colleges and universities : preparation of teach-
ers in, xv, 4; relations with normal schools,
39 f. ; see also Universities.
Collegiate courses: nature of, 149 fE; students
in, 177; professional, 177 if.; in normal
schools, list of, Tables 1, 2, pp. 406 ff., 411.
Collegiate curricula in Missouri normal schools,
166; organisation of, 392 f.
Collegiate programs of normal school students,
318 1, Tables 42, 43, pp. 434 f.
Collegiate teachers, Secondary work of, 285,
Table 19, p. 425.
Colored population of Missouri, 17.
Colored teachers, see Lincoln Institute.
Columbia, Missouri, pays bonus for university,
36.
Commercial subjects, Courses in, 243, Tables
1, 2, pp. 409, 411; mixture of students in.
243.
Commissioner of Education, Proposed State,
65 f., 68, 388 f.; United States, reports of,
20.
Common school branches, 173.
Composition of classes in normal schools, 314 f.
Composition, Tests of training schools in, 452.
Concentration: of practice teaching, 222; of high
school curricula, 262.
Conclusions, General statement of, 7.
Conclusions and proposals of the study, 387 ff. ;
constitutional modifications, 388; legisla-
tive provisions, 388 f. ; administrative poli-
cies, 390; purpose and scope of normal
schools, 391 ; curricula, 391 ff.; staff of in-
struction, 395 ; the student body, 396.
"Conference agreement" of normal schools
(1916), 61 f.; value of, 62; extension of, 62;
provisions of, 89 ; standard for instructors,
104 f.; for teaching programs, 110, note 4;
establishes secondary curriculum, 164; ter-
minology of, 164, note; should have time to
mature, 387.
Conference of Missouri normal school presi-
dents (1914), 162.
Conferences of practice teachers, 217.
Constitution of Missouri, 18; of 1820, schools for
poor, 19, note; changes proposed in pres-
ent, 388; changes not indispensable, 388,
note.
Control of normal schools, see Normal schools
in Missouri.
Correlations of selected abilities of pupils in
Missouri training schools : speed and qual-
ity of writing in two different tests ; speed
or silent reading and quality of reproduc-
tion; quality of reproduction in different
tests; "auditory" and " visual" reproduc-
tion, 454, 456,
Course, Length of, in early normal schools, 29,
32.
Courses in normal schools: organization of,
172 fF.; "curriculum," 227; how profession-
alized, 227, 393 ; lack of sequence in, 302 ff. ;
'integrating, 183, 224, 394.
Secondary professional, 173; common school
branches, 173; psychology of learning, 174;
rural life problems, 174; rural school man-
agement, 175; methods and observation,
176.
Collegiate professional, 177 ff.; object of, 393;
position of, 393; "introduction to teach-
ing," 189 f. ; specific methods, 225 ff. ; list of
(1917-18), Tables 1, 2, pp. 406, 411.
Collegiate academic, 228 ff.; English and pub-
lic speaking, 228 if.; ancient languages,
462
INDEX
232 f. ; modern foreign languages, 234 f. ; his-
tory and government, 235 f.; mathematics,
236 if.; physics and chemistry, 238 f.; bot-
any, zoology, physiology, hygiene, and
sanitation, 239 f.; geography and geology,
240; agriculture, 340 f.; fine arts, 242 f.;
commercial subjects, 243 f. ; manual or in-
dustrial arts, 245; home economics, 245 f. ;
library economy, 246; physical training,
247; list of (1917-18), Tables 1,2, pp. 406 if. ,
411.
Courtis tests, 443; diagrams of training-school
records in, 455,
Council, Administrative, for preparation of
teachers, 56 f., 97, 390.
County superintendents, see Superintendents.
Cousin, M., on preparation of teachers (1835),
25, 26.
Credentials: for admission, 308; abandoned in
favor of ** proving up," 311 ; policy regard-
ing: at Kirksville, 330 ; at Warrensburg,
336; at Cape Girardeau, 338; at Spring-
field, 339; at Maryville, 342; proper treat-
ment of, 343, note I ; see also Credit.
Credit at normal schools : pressure for academic,
74f. ; bonus system at Cape Girardeau, 319 f. ;
standard too low, 320; administration of,
328; at Kirksville, 328 if.; at Warrensburg,
336 f. ; at Cape Girardeau, 337 ff. ; at Spring-
field, 339 ff.; at Maryville, 341 f.; essentials
of administration of, 342 if.; general princi-
ple of, 344; conclusions on, 396; data con-
cerning, 403.
Critic teachers : training of, 100, 283; status of,
213,394; conclusions regarding, 395 ; see also
Supervision of practice teaching.
Crisis, Present, in public education, 13.
Cummings, H. B., 443.
Curricula in normal schools: provisional stan-
dards for, 4; definition of, 394; problems in
construction of, 128 ff. ; preparatory, prefer-
ably non-prescriptive, 131; residence re-
quirements, 131 if.; prescription versus elec-
tion of studies, 144 ff.; "equivalence" of
courses in, 146.
Differentiation in : extent and criteria of, 148;
organized professional training, 149; nature
of collegiate professional courses, 150 f.;
professional courses for high school teach-
ers, 151 f.; degree of, 153 f.; advantage
of, 153; mental and physical reasons for,
155; objections to, 156; for administration,
159; for rural teachers, 160; conclusions on,
392.
in Missouri: early forms, 29, 30, 32, 33; early
provision for high school graduates at War-
rensburg, 309; reorganization (1904), 309 f. ;
in proposed reorganization, 58; favorable
opportunity for reorganization, 124; present
organization, 161 ff. ; characteristics, 161 ff.;
as "ladders of promotion," 162 f.
Secondary: rural certificate, 164; contradic-
tory aims of, 165; should be abolished, 130,
166; professional courses, 173; conclusions
on, 392.
Collegiate, 166 ff. : non-professional character
of, 168; organization of specific courses,
172; general principle of organization, 183,
392 f.; coordination of courses in, 202 f.; ob-
servation, courses in, 211 f.; courses in spe-
cific methods, 225 ff.; courses in academic
subjects, 228.
Selection and distribution of, 258 ff., 395;
concentration necessary, 260 f.; results with
undifferentiated schools, 260; concentra-
tion of, in Latin, 261 ; in all high school sub-
jects, 262 ; effect of present policies on, 264;
number and kind needed, 265 ff.
Relation of president to, 274, 276; effect of
male attendance, 294, of transient attend-
ance, 302; regulation of, in summer, 306;
effect of prescription on classification of
students, 3161; quality of teaching a fac-
tor in, 247, 394 f.; administration of the
school an element in, 353 f., 397; effect of
elective system on (10 cases), 167 f., 411 if.;
list of collegiate courses (1917-18), Tables
1, 2, pp. 406 ff., 411; collegiate offerings
(1917-18) by departments, Table 2, p. 411;
for kindergartners, in Harris Teachers Col-
lege, 417; for elementary teachers, in Har-
ris Teachers College, 169; in Kansas City
training school, 418; conclusions as to,
391 if.
" Curriculum" courses, 227.
Curriculum of the training school, 219 ff.
DAMON, L. P., 443.
Data used in study of the preparation of teach-
ers in Missouri, 6, 401 ff.; treatment of, 404.
Dates of establishment of state normal schools,
418.
Dearborn, Walter F., 5, 404, 443.
Dearmont, W. S., 402.
De Garmo, Charles, 188, note.
Degrees: four-year, granted in Missouri nor-
mal schools, 37, 87 f., 344, Table 48, p. 437.
of teachers in Missouri normal schools, 100 f.,
Table 8, p. 420; class of institution grant-
ing, Table 8 B, p. 420; by departments,
282 f. , Table 9, p. 421 ; names of institutions
granting, Table 10, p. 422.
in the Soldan High School, St. Louis, 101,
Table 8 B, p. 420.
in the University of Missouri, 101, Table 8 B,
p. 420.
Democracy: among teachers, 181; and educa-
tion, xvii f.» 7; as justification of local con-
trol, 75 f.
Denominational colleges in Missouri, 19.
Departments in normal schools: qualifications
of teachers in various, 282; freedom of
teachers in, 277; salaries in, 284; degrees
of teachers in, Table 9, p. 421.
Dewey, John, 186, 188.
INDEX
463
Diesterweg, F. A. W., promotes preparation of
teachers, 27.
Differentiation of curricula : extent and criteria
of, 148 ff.; advantage of, 153; required de-
gree of, 153 f.; mental and physical reasons
for, 153; objections to, 156 ff.; preparation
for administration, 159; preparation of
rural teachers, 160; conclusions on, 395.
Differentiation of normal schools, 260 ; need of,
260; results of, applied to Latin, 261; in
high school curricula, 262; advantages of,
263.
Diplomas in normal schools : early forms of,
344; present forms of, 345; see also De-
grees.
Distributed practice teaching, 222.
Distribution of normal school graduates (1915),
357.
"Dropped" students in normal schools, 322,
note 2.
Duplication of normal school classes, 258, 395.
Dwight, Henry E., on preparation of teachers
(1829), 25.
locale normale, 26.
Education :
American : superficial character of, xvii; im-
portance of the teacher in, 8; requirements
of, in a democracy, xvii; effect of war on,
xviii; present crisis in, xviii, 13, 15; re-
sources available for, 14.
History of, see History.
List of collegiate courses in (1917-18), Tables
1, 2, pp. 406, 411. ,
in Missouri: effect of Civil War on, 19; pri-
vate academies, 19; religious influences,
19; "subscription "schools, 19; schools for
poor, 19, note; state superintendency cre-
ated, 19; recent legislation, 20; statistical
criteria of, SO ; not hampered by race prob-
lem, 21.
State department of: relations with training
institutions, 67f.; proposed organization of,
in Missouri, 68; see also Administration,
State educational.
Teachers of, 100, 213 f., 248, 283 f.; conclu-
sions regarding, 395.
** Educational adviser," as aid to teachers in
normal schools, #55 f.
Educational control, State: reorganization of,
63 if.; unification of, in Missouri, 65; in
Massachusetts, 65 f.; in Wisconsin, 65 f.; in
Illinois, 65 f.; in Iowa, (56; in Kansas, 66;
in Montana, 66 f.
Educational institutions in Missouri, Method
of locating, 35.
Elective system: versus prescription of studies,
144 ff.; professional student not qualified
for, 146; attitude of student not improved
by, 147; not a reliable measure of a teach-
er, 254,
in Missouri normal schools, 166 ff.; wasteful
results of, 259; restricted by economic sit-
uation, 261; effects of: on teachers, 277 f.;
on students, 279; on curricula, 166 if., Table
3, pp. 411 ff.; conclusions regarding, 392 ff.
Elementary instruction, Attitude of Missouri
normal schools toward, 170.
Elementary teachers : normal schools in early
period chiefly for, 83 f.; number needed in
Missouri, 267 ; among normal school gradu-
ates (1915), 358.
in Missouri (1915) : state at large, 364; num-
bers and distribution of, 364; training of,
365; contributions of normal schools to,
366; salaries of, 367 f.; in St. Louis and
Kansas City, 368; numbers and training,
368 f.; salaries, 369; normal school attend-
ance of, Tables 51-55, pp. 438 f.
English and public speaking, 228; number and
variety of courses, 228; professional char-
acter of, 239 ; list of collegiate courses (1917-
18), Tables 1, 2, pp. 406, 411.
Enrolment in normal schools : total classified,
Table 22 A, p. 428; "standard," Table 22 B,
p. 428; of men, Table 23, p. 428; secondary,
Table 25, p. 429.
Entrance requirements, see Admission to nor-
mal schools.
Examinations in Missouri normal schools : for
admission, 308 ; early practice, 321 ; relation
to elimination, 325; effect of present pol-
icy, 327 ; advantage of general final, 327.
Expansion, Motives for, 92 f.
Expenditure for schools per capita of school
population in Missouri, SO.
Expenditures for normal schools, State, 38 f.,
441.
Experience in teaching: of students in normal
schools, 123 f., £97, Tables 38, 39, p. 433; of
teachers in normal schools, 105 f., 281,
Tables 12-14, pp. 439 f.
Experimental elementary school of the Univer-
sity of Missouri, 443, note 1.
Experimental schools, 220 f., 394.
FACULTIES of normal schools, see Teachers in
normal schools.
Failures of students in normal schools, 321 ff.,
Tables 44, 45, p. 435; seasonal variation in,
325, Table 45, p. 435.
Families : of students in normal schools, size of,
1 18, Table 32, p. 431 ; other teachers in, 1 18,
Table 33, p. 433; income of, 117.
of teachers in normal schools, other teachers
in, 99, Table 7, p. 419.
Fathers : of students in normal schools, occupa-
tions of, 117, Table 28, p. 430.
of teachers in normal schools, occupations
of, 99, Table 6, p. 419.
Finances, Normal school : economy of reorgan-
ized system of control, 58 f.; of differenti-
464
INDEX
ated curricula, 258 f. , 369 f.; state partici-
pation in, 38 f., 441.
Financial attraction of teaching, 118, 1S5, Table
30, p. 431.
Financial support of teachers, xvii, xviii, 10,
12-15; of teachers in normal schools, 114 f. ,
284 ff., 290, 395; set also Salaries.
Fine arts, 242 : mixture of students in courses,
242; list of collegiate courses, Tables 1, 2,
pp. 409, 411.
Foreign languages, Modern, 234; list of collegi-
ate courses, Tables 1, 2, pp. 407, 411.
Foster, Richard B., at Lincoln Institute, 385.
Francke's Semmarmm praeceptorum, 27.
Frederick the Great, Influence of, on prepara-
tion of teachers, 27.
Froebel, F., 186, 187.
Function of the normal school, Statement on
(1866), 33.
Funds, school, in Missouri, Income of, 20.
Furst, Clyde, 5.
GALLAUDET Society, New Britain, Connecticut
(1850), 24.
Gallaudet, Thomas H.,on preparation of teach-
ers (1825), 24.
General method, Course in : history of the name,
187 ; present status of, 189 ; best position of,
189; at Harris Teachers College, 189.
and principles of teaching, 187 ff.
Geography, Courses in (1917-18), 240, Tables
1, 2, pp. 408, 411.
Geology, Courses in, 240, Table 1, p. 408.
German: collegiate rating of, at Kirksville,
332; courses in, see Modern foreign lan-
guages.
German element in Missouri, 16; among stu-
dents in normal schools, 117, Table 27, p.
429.
Germany, Example of, in preparation of teach-
ers, 25, 27.
Governor of Missouri, xv, 3 ; requests study of
teacher-training, 3.
Government, Courses in, 235, Table 1, p. 407.
Government and control of normal schools, see
Normal schools.
Grades, Effect of u approved," on attendance,
292.
(ratings) of students in normal schools (1913-
14), 321 ff., Tables 44, 45, p. 435.
School, of pupils taught by normal school
graduates (1915), 358.
Graduate degrees of teachers in normal schools,
103 ff.
Graduates : of high schools: qualitative distribu-
tion among subsequent occupations, 121 f.,
Table 36, pp. 432 f.
of normal schools : data concerning, 403 ;
definition difficult, 357 ; proportion of two-
year, 357 ; of 1915 : distribution, occupa-
tion, and salaries of, 357 if., Table 49, p.
437 ; total number from four-year curricula,
88, Table 48, p. 437; at University of Mis-
souri, 360 f.
Graduation from normal schools : history of. in
Missouri, 344 f. ; unaffected by certification,
345; relation to total attendance, 84-5; time
required for : at Kirksville, 334 f. ; at War-
rensburg, 337; at Cape Girardeau, 339; at
Springfield, 340 f. ; at Maryville, 342 ; con-
clusions on, 396.
Greek, Collegiate courses in (1917-18), Table 1,
p. 407; see also Ancient languages.
HALL, Samuel R., on preparation of teachers,
23.
Harnisch, Wilhelm, aids preparation of teach-
ers, 27.
Harris Teachers College : establishment of, 34- ;
as local vocational institution, 126" ; should
be a state school, 60 f., 127 ; function of, in
reorganized state system, 61 ; estimate of
work done by, 205 ; compared with state
schools, 272.
Teachers at, 116 f.; programs of, 110; data
from, 402.
Students at, 99, 125 ff.; inbreeding of, 126 f.;
failures of, 323 f.; data from, 402 f.
Curricula at, 144 f., 169, 41 7 f.; coordination
of courses, 202 ff. , 203, note ; courses in ob-
servation, 211 f.; for kindergartners, 417.
Practice facilities, 196; apprentice system,
202 ff.; defects and advantages, 203; sug-
gested improvements, 204 ; concentrated
practice, 224; position of practice, 224 ; pro-
gram of studies in Wyrnan School, 220.
Product of, 369, 372, 376.
Harvard-Newton Composition Scale, 452.
Harvard University, Studies of students at, 998,
note 1 ; general examinations at, 328.
Hecker, J. J., opens teachers seminary (1748),
p. 27.
Herbart, J. F., 186; theory of teaching, 188.
High school, State, for belated students, 300 f.,
396.
High school attendance : of normal school stu-
dents, 119 ff., Table 35, p. 432 ; results of,
compared with normal school training,
122 f.; of students at Harris Teachers Col-
lege, 125; of secondary students in normal
schools, 296 f.; opportunities for, 120, 297;
desirability of, for young secondary stu-
dents in normal schools, 298.
High school principals, Data from, 372, note
1,376, note 4, 404.
High school subjects, Organization of, for
teachers, 151 f.
High school teachers in Missouri : preparation
of, in normal schools, 85, 170, Tables 56, 57,
p. 439 ; number and kind needed in Missouri
(1915), 267 f.; normal school graduates
(1915) among, 358; subjects taught by, Ta-
ble 58, p. 440; employed in summer sessions
INDEX
465
of normal schools, 289; in state at large
(1915), 372 ff.; numbers and training of,
373 ; contribution of normal schools to,
373 if. ; salary of, 375 ; in St. Louis and Kan-
sas City (1915), 375 f.; numbers and train-
ing of, 375 f.; salary of, 376.
High school training-classes, 130; a temporary
policy, 130; in Minnesota, 176f.; increased
demands upon, 369.
High schools: development of, 85 f,; as incipient
normal schools, 86 ; relations with normal
schools, B6f., 313 ; relations with university,
87 ; instruction in, how "advanced," 133 f.;
social distinctions of, 134 f.; free tuition at,
in Missouri, 398, note 2 ; quality of gradu-
ates attending normal schools, Table 36,
p. 432.
History of education, 184; variations in, among
Missourischools, 184; function of, in teacher-
training, 184; textbooks on, 184, note; value
of, in teacher-training, 185 f.; suggested re-
organization of, 186 f.; place of, m curricu-
lum, 393; courses in, Table 1, p. 406.
History, political and social science, Courses in
(1917-18), 235 f., Tables 1, 2, pp. 407 f., 411.
History, Professionalized course in, 151.
Hollister, H. A., Study by, 185, note.
Holmes, Henry W., 450.
Home economics, Courses in, 245, Tables 1, 2,
pp. 410 f.; mixture of students in, 245.
Housing, why not considered, 4.
Hygiene, Courses in, 239, Table 1, p. 408.
IDAHO, rank in wealth and school expenditure,
91.
Illinois, Educational organization in, 65.
Illinois school survey, 154.
Illinois, University of, 405.
Illiteracy, White, in Missouri, 20; due to poor
rural schools, 161.
Immigration into Missouri, 16.
Income of fathers of normal school students,
11 7, Table 29, p. 431.
Industrial arts, Courses in, 245, Tables 1, 9, pp.
410 f.
Industries in Missouri, 17.
lt Initiative " not helped by election, 148.
Inspection of practice teaching, 216 f.
Insurance of normal school teachers, 116.
u Integrating" courses, 394.
Intelligence versus skill in teaching, 393.
Intentions of students in normal schools as to
teaching, 124, 943 ff., £99 f., Tables 40, 41,
p. 434.
Intermediate grades, Training for, 154.
" Introduction to teaching," 174, 182, 399.
Iowa, Educational organization in, 66.
JEFFERSON- CITY, Conference at, 3.
Jesuits, 186.
Johonnot, James, 84.
Johnson, W. R., on preparation of teachers
(1895), 23.
Josselyn, H. W., 5, 405.
Journal of Education, 99 f.
Judd, C. H., and Parker, S. C., quoted, 184,
note 2, 913, note 1.
Judgments of Missouri teachers concerning ele-
ments in their training, 181, note 1, 184,
189, 226, 442.
Julius, H., influence on preparation of teachers
(1834), 25,
w, I. L., 5.
Kansas City: elementary teachers at, 368 if. ; high
school teachers at, 373, 375 f.; supervisors
at, 371 f.; curriculum of training school at,
418.
Kansas, Educational organization in, 66.
Kansas silent reading tests, 451. ,
Kelly, F. J., quoted, 213.
Kindergartners : curriculum for, at Harris
Teachers College, 417 f.; differentiated cur-
riculum for, 153.
Kingsley, James L., on preparation of teachers
(1823), 22.
Kirksville, Normal school at : establishment of,
34; as state school, 35; Joseph Baldwin at,
34 f . ; dispute over location of, 36 ; growth in
numbers, 37; early finances, 38 f.; early or-
ganization, 82 f .; early professional purpose
at, 70; "People's College" at, 71 f.; official
literature of, 52 f,; function of president at,
274, note; summer school administration
at, 290 f.; attitude toward examinations,
308, note 2, 309; examinations disappear
from, 310, note 4; records at, 330 ff. ; 4 ' merit
system" at, 329; administration of credit
at, 89, 96, 328 ff.; time required for gradua-
tion, 334 ff.
Teachers at: data from, 401; degrees of, 100,
notes 1, 2, p. 101, Tables 8, 9, pp. 420 1;
training of, 102; programs of, 108, Table 17,
p. 425 ; salaries of, 114, Table 15, p. 423; sal-
aries by departments, Table 16, p. 424; sal-
aries in department of education, 284; sec-
ondary and collegiate work of, 285 ff.,
290 f., Table 19, p. 425; exceptional excel-
lence of, 355; part-time student-teachers
at, 287; meetings of, 275; salaries and pro-
grams of summer instructors (1916), 290,
Table SI, p. 427; training of summer in-
structors (1916), 289, Table 20, p. 426.
Students at : data from, 403 f.; classified total
enrolment of, 294, 301, note, Tables 22-25,
pp. 428 f,; teachers' opinions on student at-
tendance, 306 ; nationality of parents, Table
27, p, 429; occupation of father, Table 98,
p. 430; income of father, Table 29, p. 431;
size of family, Table 32, p. 431 ; other teach-
ers in family, Table 33,p. 432; normal school
attendance of family, Table 34, p. 432; high
school attendance of, Table 35, p. 439;
teaching experience of, Table 38, p. 433;
466
INDEX
teaching intentions of, Table 40, p. 434;
programs of (1913-14), 318 f., Tables 42,
43, pp. 434 f.; grades of (1913-14), Tables
37, 44, 45, pp. 433, 435; comparison of
grades of students prepared at normal
schools and those prepared at high schools,
Table 37, p. 433; method of classifying stu-
dents, 314; composition of classes, 314 if.;
size of classes, 436.
Development of curriculum at, 328 f.; elective
system, 167, 314 ff.; election of profes-
sional studies, 168, note 2; course in rural
life problems, 175, note 2; modern foreign
languages, 234; history and government,
235; omission of biology, 239 f.; geogra-
phy, 240; agriculture, 240; fine arts, 242;
commercial subjects, 243 f.; library econ-
omy, 246; physical training, 247; list of
collegiate courses (1917-18), Tables 1, 2,
pp. 406, 411; practice facilities, 195 ff.;
model rural school, 176.
Training school at : organization and proced-
ure in, 200 f.; housing and equipment of,
197, 198; program of, 220; lesson plans at,
21 5 f.; conferences of practice teachers at,
218; standard tests of, 443 ff. : arithmetic,
446 ff., 455; spelling, 449 f.; penmanship,
450 f . ; reading, 451 ; composition, 452 ; final
rank, 453; progress in selected abilities,
454 f.; selected correlations, 454, 456.
Product of: early degrees, 344; bachelor's
degrees, 88, note 3, Table 48, p. 437;
employment of graduates (1915), Tables
49, 50, pp. 437 f.; in teaching population:
rural teachers, 363; graded elementary
teachers, 365 f., Tables 51-55, pp. 438 f.;
Kansas City teachers, 370, note; high school
teachers, 374, note, Tables 56, 57, p. 439;
city and town superintendents, 378 ; county
superintendents, 380, note; judgment of
graduates as to training, 442.
LANGUAGES: ancient, 232 ff., Tables 1, 2, pp.
406 f., 411 ; modern foreign, 234 f., Tables 1,
2, pp. 407, 411.
Latin : results of concentration of curricula in,
261 f.; collegiate rating of, at Kirks ville,
332; courses in (1917-18), 232 ff., Tables 1,
2, pp. 4061,411.
Lawson, E. L, Study by, 160, note.
Learned, W. S., 5.
Leaves of absence for teachers in normal
schools, 281.
Legislation, Educational: pledge to teach,
72 f.; curricula limited by, 78, note; rela-
tion to administration, 64, 347 ff. ; required
for teacher supply, 269; for certification,
305; proposed, 388.
Lesson plans in practice teaching, 215 f.
** Liberal" courses in normal school curricula,
392.
Library economy, Courses in, 246 f., Tables 1,
2,pp, 410, Ml,
Lincoln, E. A., 443.
Lincoln Institute: history, character, and needs
of, 34, 385 f.; transferred to proposed Board
of Education, 390.
Lindsey, Philip, on preparation of teachers
(1825), 23.
Literature, Professionalized course in, 150; see
also English.
Lobbying for normal schools, 75.
Local attendance at normal schools, 118 f.; at
Harris Teachers College, 125.
Locating educational institutions, Method of,
35 f.
N, John G., on normal schools, 31.
McMurry, Charles A., 5, 188, 404.
McMurry, Frank M., 188.
Maclean, John, on preparation of teachers
(1828), 24.
Major, Elliott W., xv, 3.
Management, School, 190 ff, ; position of courses
in, 191,393.
Mann, Horace, 28; visits Missouri, 3k
Manual or industrial arts, 245; courses in, Ta-
bles 1, 2, pp. 410, 411.
Manufactures in Missouri, 18.
Married women as teachers : attitude toward,
139; employment of, 140 ff., 391.
Mary ville, Normal school at : establishment of,
34; location of, 36; character of board at,
46; early organization of, 47; conception of
function, 73; records at, 341 f.; administra-
tion of credit at, 341 f.; summer school ad-
ministration at, 290.
Teachers at: data from, 402; training and de-
grees of, 101 ff., Table 8, p. 420; salaries of,
114, Table 15, p. 423; salaries by depart-
ments, 284, Table 16, p. 494; programs of,
Table 17, p. 425; mixture of secondary and
collegiate instruction, Table 19, p. 425; can-
vass of district by, 281 ; meetings of, 275 ;
part-time student teachers, 286 1; training
of summer instructors, 289, Table 20, p.
426 ; salaries and programs of summer in-
structors (1916), Table 21, p. 427.
Students at : data from, 402 f. ; attendance of,
37 ; teachers' opinions on irregular attend-
ance of, 306; classified total enrolment,
Tables 22-25, pp. 428 f. ; nationality of par-
ents of, 117, Table 27, p. 429; occupation
of father, Table 28, p. 430; income of fa-
ther, Table 29, p. 431; size of family, Table
32, p. 431 ; other teachers in family, Table
33, p. 432; normal school attendance of
family, Table 34, p. 432; high school attend-
ance of, 120, note 3, Table 35, p. 432; teach-
ing experience, Table 38, p. 433; teaching
intention of, Table 40, p. 434; programs of,
Tables 42 and 43, pp. 434 f.; grades of,
Tables 44 and 45, p. 435; size of classes,
Table 46, p. 436; method of classification,
316; administration of credit, 341 f.; pledge
INDEX
467
to teach, 307 ; examinations of, 310, note 4.
Curriculum : effect of attendance on sequence
in, 303, note 2, 304; physical training, 247,
Tables 1, 2, pp. 41 Of.; practice facilities,
195 if.
Training1 school at : organization of, 201 ;
housing and equipment of, 198 ; program
of, 220 ; lesson plans at, 216 ; conferences
of practice teachers at, 218 f.; standard
tests of, 4 13 if.: arithmetic, 446 ff., 455;
spelling, 4!<9 f. ; penmanship, 450 f.; read-
ing, 451 f.; composition, 452 f.; final rank,
453 ; progress in selected abilities, 454 f . ;
selected correlations, 454, 456.
Product of ; bachelor's degrees from, Table
48, p. 437 ; employment of graduates (1915),
Table 49, pp. 437 f.; rural teachers, 362;
graded elementary teachers, 365 f., Tables
51-55, pp. 438 f.; Kansas City teachers,
370, note ; high school teachers, 374, Table
57, p. 439 ; city and town superintendents,
378; county superintendents, 380, note;
judgment of graduates as to training, 442.
Massachusetts : educational organization in,
65 f . ; rank of, in school expenditure, 20.
Massachusetts Magazine (1789), Extract from,
22.
Master of Pedagogy, Degree of, 37.
Mathematics: courses in, 236 ff., Tables 1, 2,
pp. 408, 411; composite courses in ap-
plied mathematics, 237 ;lack of professional
purpose, 237; in high school, 152; teaching
of, in normal schools, 248 ; teachers of, in
normal schools, 107, 115, 282, 284 f., 440.
Measurements of training schools, 5, 209 f.,
443 ff.
Men as normal school students, 75, 81, 292 ff.,
396, Tables 22, 23, p. 428.
Men teachers, Proportion of, in Missouri, 139.
Meriara, J. L., Study by, 182, note.
"Merit system" at Kirksville, 329.
Method and personnel of the enquiry, 5.
Methods and observation, Course in, 176.
Methods: of supervision of practice, 214; of
teaching, secondary courses in, 174; col-
legiate courses in general and special,
225 ff., 187 ff.; position of, 393 ; value of, to
teachers, 226; relation of, to subject-matter
courses, 227.
Minnesota, Training-classes in, 176 f.
Missouri, State of, 16 : surface features, 16; pop-
ulation of, characteristics of, 16; immigra-
tion into, 16; rank in wealth, 20; political
history of, 18; constitutions of, 18; desir-
able modifications in constitution of, 62,
388; educational development of, 18 ff.; in-
fluence of southern states, 19 ; educational
situation typical of United States, 20.
Model school : in early normal schools, 29 ; see
also, Training school.
Model teaching, 229 ff., 235, 236; see also,
Teaching, Training school.
Modern foreign languages, 234, Tables 1, 2, pp.
407, 411.
Money available for education, 15.
Montana, Educational organization in, 66 f.
Montclair, State normal school at : proportion of
student failures at, 323, note 1.
Monteith, John, 19, 35; on boards of regents,43;
on function of a board, 46 ; on function of
normal schools, 71, 84 f.
MoraU of the training schools, 205 ff.
Music, Courses in, 242 f., Tables 1, 2, pp. 409,
411.
JN ATIONAOTY of parents of students in normal
schools, 117, Table 27, p. 429,
Nativity of students in normal schools, 117.
Normal schools in the United States : origin and
growth of, 22 ff. ; origin of term, 26 ; legis-
lative activity in Massachusetts for (1835),
28; first opened in Massachusetts, 28; be-
come "state normal schools" in Massa-
chusetts, 28; in Connecticut, S9; versus
normal classes in colleges, academies, and
high schools, 30 ff.; in New York, 30 f.; in
Michigan, 31; in Maine, 31; in Wisconsin,
31; early (1866) view of function of, 33;
model schools in, 29; curricula in Massa-
chusetts (dr. 1840), 29; curricula in 1866,
32; dates of first establishment of state
normal schools, 418.
Normal schools in Missouri: study of, see Prep-
aration of teachers; origin and growth of,
34 ff.; early efforts for, 34; promoted by
teachers association, 34 ; three state schools
established, 19, 35 ; growth in numbers,
37; opposition to, 19, 38; financial strug-
gles, 38; effect of poverty on, 39; state ex-
penditures for, 441 ; changes in status and
scope, 36 f.; summer session, 36; develop
collegiate work, 37.
Government and control of, 4£: original
plan of a single board, 42; separate boards,
43; non-partisan provision, 43 ; attempts to
unify educational procedure, 44; function of
a board, 46; politics, 47; other weaknesses,
48; diversity of practice, 50; lack of critical
supervision, 50 r.; competition with univer-
sity, 51; proposed reorganization, 54; are-
organized university, 12, 55 f.; professional
executives, 56; effects of proposed reorgan-
ization, 57; city training schools included,
60; voluntary cooperation, 61 ; reorganiza-
tion of state educational control, 63; cen-
tralization, 63; state unit of administration,
63; advantages, 64; unification of control in
Missouri, 65; experiments elsewhere, 65;
lessons from experience, 67 ff.
Function and scope of: general function,
70 ff.; early aims, 70 ff., 301 f.; variations in
ideas of function, 71 ff.; diversity of policy,
49 f. ; effect of local control, 75 ; should be
leaders of public opinion, 76, 162; profes-
468
INDEX
sional purpose, 81 ; obligation to state, 78,
81 f. ; statutory limitations, 78, note; should
train teachers only, 78 ff. ; early organiza-
tion, 82 ff.; scope of organization, 82 ff.;
prepare high school teachers, 85 ff. ; reor-
ganization of curriculum (1904), 87, 309;
character of advanced work, 88 f., 228;
scope, how determined, 89 if.; i 'standard"
institutions, 90 f. ; reasons for present policy
of expansion, election, etc., 91 f.; motives
for expansion, 92 ff. ; service to professional
training, 95 f,; neglect of rural teachers,
160; attitude toward elementary instruc-
tion, 170; need of organized criticism, 98.
Problems in administration of: demands upon
for teacher supply, 269; presidents of,
272 ff.; male attendance at, 292 if,; sec-
ondary students at, 295 if. ; organization of
attendance at, 301 if.; propaganda to secure
students, 52; admission and classification,
307 ff.; student programs, 317 ff.; student
examinations and rating, 321 if. ; why non-
selective, 326; administration of credit,
328 ff.; graduation, certification, and ap-
pointment, 344 if. ; general tone of admin-
istration, 354.
Competition among, 50; effects, 53; local
board system responsible, 53 f.; need for
reorganization and common action, 272,
276 ; voluntary cooperation, 44, 61 f. , 89 ; re-
lations with colleges and universities, 39 f. ;
with the University of Missouri, 51 f.; credit
in the University of Missouri for work in
normal schools, 80.
Product of, 357 ff. : responsibility for teachers
in service, 352; graduation, certification,
and appointment, 344 ff. ; degrees offered,
37, 87 f. ; recipients of four-year degrees, 88,
note, Table 48, p. 437; graduates (1915),
357 ff. , Tables 49, 50, p. 437 f. ; rural school
teachers, 361 ff. ; graded elementary school
teachers, 364 ff., Tables 51-55, pp. 438 f.;
high school teachers, 372 ff., Tables 56-58,
pp. 439 f.; city and town superintendents,
376 ff*; county superintendents, 379 f.; sum-
mary of service to the state, 380 ff.; geo-
graphical limitations, 380 f.; reasons for,
381 ; influence of service vague, 381 ; spe-
cific contribution to supply of trained
teachers, 381.
Proposals for preparation of teachers in,
387 ff.
Curricula in, see Curricula.
Students in, see Students.
Teachers and teaching in, see Teachers,
Teaching.
North American Review, Extract from (1823),
OBSERVATION, Courses in, 211 ff,, Table 1, p.
406.
Occupations : of fathers of students in normal
schools, 117, Table 28, p. 430; of fathers of
teachers in normal schools, 99, Table 6, p.
419; of graduates of normal schools (1915),
357, Tables 49, 50, pp. 437 f.; of general
population in Missouri, 17.
Ohio : statement of Commissioner of Common
Schoolson functionof normal schools(1866),
33.
Olmstead, Denison , on preparmgteachers (1 81 L2 ),
22.
Ontario, Practice facilities for training teachers
in, 197, note.
Organization: of normal schools in Germany,
27 f., in United States, 28 ff., in Missouri,
34 ff.
of training for teachers in Missouri: present,
42 ff., 82 ff.; proposed, 54 ff., 388 ff.
of state educational control: general, 63 ff.;
in Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa,
Kansas, Montana, 65 ff.; proposed in Mis-
souri, 65, 67 ff., 388 ff.
of curricula, 149, 161ff. ; of specific courses,
172 ff.; of curriculum distribution, 258 if.
of normal school staff, 276 ff.; of normal
school student body, 292 ff.
Conclusions as to: external, 388 ff.; internal,
391 ff.
Osborne, George L., 38, 39, 44, 84, 355.
Oswego, Influence of normal school at, 32.
PARENTS of teachers in normal schools, 99, Ta-
ble 6, p. 419; of students in normal schools,
117, Tables 27-29, pp. 429 if.
Participation in teaching, see Training schools.
Part-time teachers in normal schools, 286 f.
Penmanship, Tests of training schools in, 450 f.
Per capita costs, Omission of, 4.
Periods, Length of, in normal schools, 110,
note 2.
Personnel of the enquiry, 5.
Personnel of Missouri normal schools, 99 ff.
Pestalozzi, J. H., 27, 186.
Physical training, Collegiate courses in (1917-
18), 247, Tables 1, 2, pp. 410, 411.
Physics and chemistry, Courses in (1917-18),
238, Tables 1, 2, pp. 408, 411.
Physiology, Courses in, 239 f., Table 1, p. 408.
Pickard, J. L., on normal schools, 31.
Pierce, John D., advocates preparation of
teachers, 31.
Plamann, J. E., opens teachers seminary in Ber-
lin (1803), 27.
Plans of lessons, 215.
Plato, on the place of education in the state, 9.
Pledge to teach: requirement of, 72, 307; im-
portance of, 307.
Politics in boards of regents, 47 f.
Population of Missouri: characteristics of, 16;
German element in, 16 f.; colored element
in, 17; gain and loss in, 17; occupations of,
' typical of United States, 17.
INDEX
469
Population of Missouri, Teaching, 3, 265 if.,
361 ff., 405, Tables 51-57, pp. 438 f.
Positions sought by students in normal schools,
3 18, 293, 294, notes 3, 4, Tables 41, 49, 50,
pp. 434, 437 f .
Potter, Alonzo, advocates separate normal
schools, 30; reports on preparation of
teachers in academies, 30.
Practice schools, see Training schools.
Practice teaching, see Training1 schools.
Preparation of lessons, Time required for, in
normal schools, 320.
Preparation of teachers, Study of : requested by
the Governor of Missouri, xv, 3; inaugu-
rated at conference, 3; endorsed by Mis-
souri educators, 3; original plans of Foun-
dation, 3; development of, xv, 3f.; in col-
leges and universities, xv, 4; character and
circumstances, 3; method and personnel,
5 ff.; nature of treatment, xvi, 6; limited
to educational features, 4; Missouri typical
of the entire country, 5; field work in, 6;
cooperation of normal school teachers, 6 f. ;
relations with normal schools, 6 f., 354 f.;
data from normal schools, 6, 401 ff.; data
from state at large, 6, 405; omission of re-
cent changes, 6; conclusions of, 7 ff., 387 ff.
Preparation of teachers: nature of problem, 3;
a state enterprise, 3; aim identical through-
out the country, 4; importance of, to demo-
cracy, 7; new standards essential, 9; obli-
gations of state and city educational offi-
cers, 12,
State administration of: a homogeneous un-
dertaking, 55; central control for, 55, 65;
professional board of executives for, 56 f.,
390; effects of proposed reorganization,
57 ff.; chief problem of state administra-
tion, 65 ff.
Standards of: two theories of training, 76; ob-
stacles disappearing, 79 f. ; tendency to im-
prove, 128, 138; good results from, 128;
subject-matter well developed, 128; a prob-
lem of equal justice, 129; Missouri's com-
promise program, 129 f.; money cost tri-
fling, 129; residence requirements, 131 ff.;
should be equivalent for all teachers, 132;
disparity of training injurious, 137 f.; out-
look for a new program, 139; need of ex-
tended service, 139 ff.; relation of marriage
to, 139 ff., 144; effect of prolonged tenure
on, 144; prescription versus election in,
144 ff.; differentiation in, 148; "broad
scholarship," 149; incidental versus organ-
ized training, 149.
Proposals for, in Missouri, 387 ff.; see also,
Administration ; Curricula ; Normal schools ;
Students; Training schools; Teachers.
Preparation of teachers in service in Missouri:
see Teachers in Missouri (rural; graded
elementary; high school; normal school).
Preparation of the teachers in the Missouri
normal schools, see Teachers in normal
schools.
Prescribed cnrricula, Need of, 144 ff., 166 ff.,
228 f., 259 f., 277 f., 295, 316 f., 391 ff.
Prescription: definition of, I4>5; versus election
of studies, 144 ff.
Presidents of normal schools : powers and duties
of, 273; function and prerogative of, 274 f.;
prerogative should be limited, 276; pro-
posed council of, 56 f., 390; duties of coun-
cil, 390 f. ; conclusions regarding, 395.
Primary grades, Training for, 153.
Principals: elementary: at St. Louis, 371 f., at
Kansas City, 371 f.; high school, 372, note
1, 376, note 4; data from, 404 f.
Principles of teaching: course in, 187 ff., Table
1, p. 406; position of, 393.
Pritchett, Henry S., xix, 5.
Product of normal schools in Missouri, 357 ff.;
graduates of 1915 : distribution and occupa-
tion of, 357 1, Tables 49, 50, pp. 437 f. ; re-
lation of salaries to training, 359 f.; normal
school graduates at the university, 360 f.;
students among the teaching population,
361 ff.: in rural schools, 361 ff.; in graded
elementary schools, 364 ff.; in high schools,
372 ff.; as city and town superintendents,
376 ff.; as county superintendents, 379 f.;
service of the normal schools to the state,
380 ff.
Professional courses: secondary, 164 ff., 173 ff.,
392, Table 1, p. 406; collegiate, 166 ff.,
177 ff. , 392 ff., Tables 1, 2, pp. 406, 411 ; in-
terschool variations in, 178; introductory
psychology, 178 f.; advanced psychology,
179 ff. ; history of education, 184 ff.; general
method and principles of teaching, 187 ff. ;
school management, class management,
and school economy, 190 ff.; observation,
participation, and practice teaching, 192 ff.
Professional subjects, Teachers of, in normal
schools: training of, 100, 213 f,, 248, 283,
Table 9, p. 421 ; tenure and experience of,
284; salaries of, 213 f., 284 f., Table 16, p.
424.
Professional training, see Preparation of teach-
ers ; Curricula ; Normal schools.
Professionalized academic courses, 149 ff., 297,
231, 234 ff.; curricula, 149 ff., 392.
Program of studies in training schools, 219ff.;
responsibility for, 219; character of, 219.
Programs: of teachers in normal schools, 108 f.,
264 f., Table 17, p. 425; in summer (1916),
p 290, Table 21, p. 427 ; of students in nor-
mal schools, 317 IF., Tables 3, 43, 43, pp.
411 ff., 434 f.; pressure for speed in, 317 f.;
objections to restrictions, 318 ; collegiate
programs, 318f.; at Cape Girardeau, 318 f.;
secondary programs, 319 f.; at Cape Girar-
deau, 320; standard of credit, 320; conclu-
sions on, 396.
Progress of training schools in selected abilities,
454, 455.
Proposals for preparation of teachers in normal
schools, 387 ff.
470
INDEX
" Proving up" for admission to normal schools,
308, 310.
Prussia, Influence of, on preparation of teach-
ers in United States, £5, 26.
Psychology: secondary course in, 174; collegi-
ate introductory course in, 178 f.; advanced
courses in, 179 ; significance of, in teaching,
179ff.; proposed reorganization of, l«2f.,
393; experimental, effect of, 188; courses in,
Table 1, p. 406.
Public speaking, Courses in, 228, Table 1, p.
406.
Puckett, C. A., 443.
Purpose of normal schools : statement on (1866),
S3; present, 78 if., 391.
QUALITY of administration in normal schools,
353 ff.
Quality of students in normal schools as rated
by their high school principals, 121 f. , Table
36, p. 432 f.
Quality of teaching in normal schools, 247 ff.
RATINGS of normal school students by theirhigh
school principals, m f., Table 36, p. 433 f.
Ratings of students at normal schools, 391 ff.:
selective function of, 321; early Missouri
practice, 321 ; failures (1913-14), p. 322,
Table 44, p. 435; comparison with Harris
Teachers College, 323 f.; seasonal changes
in, 325, Table 45, p. 435; effect of examina-
tions on, 325 f . ; why non-selective, 326 ; lack
of examinations a weakness, 327 f.; data
concerning, 403.
Ratings of students from high schools and from
normal schools compared, 123, Table 37, p.
433.
Reading, Tests of training schools in, 451 f.
Recommendations, Statement of, 387,
Records of normal schools; at Kirksvilte, 329,
note 2, 330 if.; at Warrensburg, 336 f,; at
Cape Girardeau, 337 ff.; at Springfield,
339 if.; at Maryville, 341 f.; suggested sys-
tem of, 342, 343, note 1; conclusions on,
396.
Redlich, Josef, 190.
Religious influence in Missouri education, 19,
35.
Research in normal schools, 110 f.
Roberts, Dorothy R., 6.
Rolla, Mo., City of, and its bond issue, 36*
Rousseau,!. J., 187.
Rural certificate, 163, 164 ff., 173 ff.
Rural life problems, Course In, 174 f.
Rural school management, 175 f.
Rural school teachers: preparation of, 160f.;
attitude of normal schools toward, 165;
number required in Missouri, 266; how pro-
vide for, 268 E; inexperienced, 266; normal
school graduates (1915) among, 357 f.
in teaching population (1915): definition,
numbers, and training of, 361 f.; attendance
at normal schools, 362; salaries of, 362 f.;
inexperienced, training of, 363.
Russell, William, on preparation of teachers
(1823), 22 f.
ST. Louis : rank of school system at, 21 ; City
Normal School at, 34; should have a state
school, 60 f.; inbreeding of teachers detri-
mental, 126; apprentice system of practice
teaching at, 202 ff.; elementary teachers at,
368 ff.; high school teachers at, 375 f.; su-
pervisors at, 371 f.; see «&<y, Harris Teach-
ers College.
St. Louis Normal School, see Harris Teachers
College.
Salaries of teachers: attitude of educational
officers toward, 14.
in Missouri : increases indispensable, 269 f. ;
effect upon quality of service, 382 f.; in
rural schools, 363; in graded elementary
schools, 367 ff.; in high schools, 375 f.; of
superintendents, city and town, 379; of
county superintendents, 380; of normal
school graduates (1915), 359 f.
in normal schools, 114 f., Tables 15, 16, 18, pp.
423 ff.; departmental distribution of, 2H4,
Table 16, p. 424 ; variation in, 284; by grade
of work, 285, Table IB, p. 425 ; in summer
session, 290 f., Table 21, p. 427.
at the University of Missouri, 114, Table 15,
p. 423.
Sanitation, Courses in, 239, Table 1, p. 408.
Santee, A. M., Study by, 194, 213.
Scholarship, Productive, of normal school teach-
ers, 111 f.
School attendance in Missouri, 20.
School expenditure in Missouri, 20.
School management: secondary course in rural,
175 ; collegiate course in, 190, Table 1, p.
406; at Harris Teachers College, 190 ; rela-
tion to other subjects, 191.
School sessions in Missouri, Average length of,
20.
Schools in Missouri : average expenditure per
capita of school population, 20; average
days attendance per pupil, 20; average at-
tendance per school child, SO; average
length of session, 20; per cent daily attend-
ance, SO; per cent secondary attendance,
20; average monthly salaries, 20; income of
school funds, 20; illiteracy, 20.
Science, Courses in, 23S, 239, Table 1, pp. 408 f.
Scope of normal school organization, $% ff.; how
determined, 89 ff.; conclusions as to, 391;
see also Normal schools.
Secondary instruction : by normal school teach-
ers, 3851, Table 19, p. 495; in normal
schools, 166, 289, 295 if. , 396.
Secondary professional courses and curricula,
see Curricula.
INDEX
471
Secondary programs of normal school stu-
dents, 319 f., Table 43, p. 435.
Secondary students in normal schools, see Stu-
dents.
Selective function of normal schools, 331 ; why
weak in Missouri, 326; conclusions on, 396.
Self-help among normal school students, Extent
of, 118, Table 31, p. 431.
Sequence: of professional courses, 183 f., 186,
189, 191, 224, 393; lack of, due to shifting
attendance, 302 if., or to elective system,
166 ff., 278 f.
Service of Missouri normal schools to the state,
4.1, 380 ff.
Sex: of teachers in normal schools, 99, Table 5,
p. 419; of students in normal schools, 117.
Table 22, p. 428.
Skill versus professional intelligence in teach-
ing, 179 ff., 393.
Shannon, R. D., 38; on boards of regents, 43.
Shaw, E. A., 443.
Slavery in Missouri, 18.
Soldan High School, St. Louis : degrees of teach-
ers in, 101, Table 8 B, p. 420; experience of
teachers in, 107, note.
South Carolina, Proportion of secondary school
attendance in, 20, note.
Southern states, Influence of, on educational
development of Missouri, 19.
"Special methods" courses, 325 ff.
Spelling, Tests of training schools in, 449 f.
Spencer, Herbert, 186, 187.
Spencer, John C., on preparation of teachers,
30.
Springfield, Normal school at : establishment of,
31; location of, 36; crowded conditions at,
49; conception of function, 73; attitude
toward examinations, 310, note 4; records
at, 339 f.; administration of credit at, 339 ff.;
notable traits in, 356.
Teachers at: data from, 402; training of,
101 f., Table 8, p. 420; programs of, 108,
Table 17, p. 425; salary of, 114, Table 15,
p. 423; salaries by departments, 284, Table
16, p. 424; salaries in the department of ed-
ucation, 285; meetings of, 275; leaves of
absence, 281 ; extent of secondary instruc-
tion, Table 19, p. 425; summer instructors:
training of, 289, Table 20, p. 426; salaries
and programs of, Table 21, p. 437.
Students at : data from, 403 f. ; attendance of,
37; classified total enrolment, Tables 22-25,
pp. 428 f.; proportion of secondary attend-
ance, 301, note, Table 25, p. 429; teachers
opinions on irregular attendance, 306 ; na-
tionality of parents of, Table 27, p. 429; oc-
cupation of father, Table 28, p. 430; income
of father, Table 29, p. 431; size of family,
Table 32, p. 431 ; other teachers in family,
Table 33, p. 432; normal school attendance
of family, Table 34, p. 432; high school at-
tendance of, 119, note 6, Table 35, p. 432;
teaching experience of, Table 38, p. 433;
programs of (1913-14), 298, 318, Tables 42,
43, pp. 434 f.; grades of (1913-14), 322, Ta-
bles 37, 44, 45, pp. 433, 435; comparison
of grades of students prepared at normal
schools and those prepared at high schools,
122, Table 37, p. 433; method of classifica-
tion, 316; size of classes, 264, Table 46,
p. 436.
Curriculum : observation, 212, Table 1, p. 406 ;
modern foreign languages, 234, Tables 1, 2,
pp. 407, 411 ; history and government, 235,
Tables 1, 2, pp. 407 f., 411 ; botany, zoology,
physiology, etc., 239, Table 1, p. 408 geo-
graphy, 240, Tables 1, 2, pp. 408, 411; com-
mercial subjects, 244, Tables 1,2, pp. 409 f.,
411; home economics, 246, Tables 1, 2, pp.
410 f. ; physical training, 247, Tables 1, 2, pp.
410 f. ; practice facilities, 195 ff.
Training school at: housing and equipment
of, 197 ; organization of, 201 ; morale of,
205, 207 ; standard tests of, 209 f., 443 ff.:
arithmetic, 446 ff. , 455 ; spelling, 449 f. ; pen-
manship, 450 f.; reading, 451 f.; composi-
tion, 452; final rank, 453; progress in selected
abilities, 454 f.; selected correlations, 454,
456; lesson plans, 216; supervision of prac-
tice teaching, 217; conferences of practice
teachers, 218; program of training school,
220; state course of study in, 222.
Product of: in teaching population: rural
teachers, 362; graded elementary teachers,
365 f. , Tables 51-55, pp. 438 f. ; Kansas City
teachers, 370, note; high school teachers,
374, note 6, Table 57, p. 439 ; city and town
superintendents, 378; county superintend-
ents, 380, note; four-year bachelor's de-
grees, 88, note 3, Table 48, p. 437; employ-
ment of graduates (1915), 437 f. ; judgments
of graduates as to training, 442.
Staff, Teaching, in normal schools, see Teachers
in normal schools.
Standard of credit in normal schools, 320.
"Standard" enrolment in Missouri normal
schools, Table 23 B, p. 428.
"Standard" institutions, 90 f.
Standard tests in the training schools, 209 f.,
443 ff.
Standards of preparation, Changes in, recom-
mended, 9.
Standards, Provisional, for curricula, 4.
State appropriations for normal schools, 38 f.,
441.
State Board of Education, see Board of Educa-
tion.
State department of education, see Superintend-
ent.
State educational administration, Advantages
and conditions of, 64 f.
State high schools, 300, 396.
State of Missouri, see Missouri.
State normal schools in the United States,
Dates of first establishment of, 418.
472
INDEX
State superintendent of public schools, see Su-
perintendent.
Statistics: of normal school graduates (1915),
357 ff., Tables 48-50, pp. 4371; of normal
school students, I IT if., 292 ff., 402 if., Ta-
bles 22-50, pp. 428-438; of normal school
teachers, 99 ff., 272 ff., 401 1, Tables 5-21,
pp. 419-427; of teaching population, 361 if.,
405, Tables 51-57, pp. 438 f.
Status of teachers, Distinctions in, 9, 132 if.
Stone reasoning test, 449.
Stowe, Calvin E. , on preparation of teachers
(1837), 25 f.
Strayer, George D.,5, 404.
Students, College age of: at Harvard, 298,
note 1 ; at Columbia, 298, note 1.
Students at Harris Teachers College, 125 f.
Students in normal schools, 36, 117 if., 292 if.,
428 if.; data from, 402 ff.; age and sex,
nationality and nativity, 117, Tables 26, 27,
p. 429; parental occupation and income,
117, Tables 28, 29, pp. 430 f.; size of family,
118, Table 32, p. 431; choice of vocation,
reasons for, 118; other teachers in family,
118, Table 33, p. 432; attendance of family
at normal school, 118, Table 34, p. 432;
financial attraction of teaching, 118, Table
30, p. 431; extent of self-help, 118, Table
31, p. 431; teaching experience, 123, Tables
38, 39, p. 433.
Previous education of, 119 f.; high school
attendance, 119 f., S96, Table 35, p. 432;
accessibility of high schools, 120; effect
of high school graduation on degrees, 119,
note 6.
Classified total enrolment of, Table 92, p.
428; "standard" enrolment, Table 22 B.,
p. 428 ; secondary enrolment, Table 25, p.
429 ; effect of distance on attendance, 1 18 f.;
nature of local attendance, 119 ; bad results
of unregulated attendance, 302 ff.; regu-
lated attendance desirable, 304 if. , and feas-
ible, 306 ; personal advantage placed above
needs of the service, 161.
Problems in selection, organization, and ad-
ministration of, 292 ff.; admission, 307 ff.;
classification, 177, 313 ff.; size of classes,
S58, 264 f., Tables 46, 47, pp. 436 f.; pro-
grams, 317 ff., 396, Tables 42, 43, pp. 434 f.;
speed the central consideration, 317; rat-
ings, 321 ff., Tables 44, 45, p. 435; ratings
of students prepared at normal schools
versus students prepared at high schools,
122 f., Table 37, p. 433.
Problem of male attendance, 81, 117, 292 ff.,
Tables 23, 24, p. 428; motives in, 292,
Tables 40, 41, p. 434; reaction on institu-
tion, 293; efforts to retain, 293; proportion
of men enrolled (1913-14), Table 23, p. 428;
changes in proportion of men since 1871,
Table 24, p. 428.
Problem of secondary attendance, 295 ff.,
Tables 22, 25, pp. 428 f.; quality and char-
acteristics of, 295-298; suggested treatment
of, 298-301.
Graduation, certification, and appointment,
344 ff., 396; intentions as to teaching, 74,
124, 292 f., Tables 40, 41, p. 434; as to study
elsewhere, 124 ; attendance at colleges, 123 ;
attendance at other normal schools, 123;
positions sought, 92 f., 29 ls Table 41, p.
434; graduates of 1915, 357 if., Tables 49,
50, pp. 437 f. ; students among the teaching-
population, 361 ff., Tables 51-57, pp. 438 f.
Quality of, as rated by their high school prin-
cipals, 121 f., 404, Table 36, pp. 4321; as
shown at the University of Missouri, 360.
Effects of normal school reorganization on,
57 ff. ; not qualified to elect studies, 146 ; at-
titude of, not improved by election, 1471;
effects of quality of administration on, 353 f. ;
as normal school instructors, 286, 290, Table
21, p. 427 ; ratio of, to supervisors, 213.
Conclusions regarding, 396.
Students at the University of Missouri, 118;
size of family, 118.
Study of preparation of teachers, see Prepara-
tion of teachers.
Subject-matter courses, how professionalized,
149 if. , 227, 231, 234 ff. , 393.
Subjects taught : by Missouri high school teach-
ers, 268, Table 58, p. 440; by normal school
graduates (1915), p. 359 ; in Missouri nor-
mal schools, combinations of, 107 f. / see also
Courses.
44 Sub-normal" department in normal schools,
308.
Summarizing courses, Place of, 183, SS4, 393.
Summer session : introduced at Warrensburg,
36, 301, note ; teachers in, 108 f., 288 ff.,
395, 401, Tables 17, 19, 20, 21, pp. 425 ff.;
regulation of curriculum in, 306 ; adminis-
tration of,290ff.
Superintendent, State: office established, 19;
reports of, 6; John Monteith, 35; on
early normal schools, 71, 83 f.; R. D. Shan-
non, 38; W. E. Coleman, 39; past services
of, 19; method of election, 65; relation to
training institutions, 65, 67 f.; in Iowa, 66;
in Kansas, 66; in Massachusetts, 66; in
Montana, 66 f.; should determine entrance
credentials for normal schools, 312; share
in certification of teachers, 348; powers
transferred to proposed board of educa-
tion, 390.
Superintendents, City and town: data from,
404; tenure of, 159 f.; demand for skilled,
140; attitude toward teachers* salaries, 14;
attitude toward normal schools, 350, 381 ;
fail to discriminate in teachers, 350 f. ; nor-
mal school graduates (1915) among, 358;
in Missouri teaching population (1915):
number and training, 3761; contribution
of normal schools to, 377 1; salaries of,
379.
County : data from, 404 ; duties and qualinca-
INDEX 473
tions of, 379 f.; training and salary of, 379 f. ;
responsibility for, 380.
Supervision, Changes in, desirable, 10.
in Missouri, county: established, 19; abol-
ished, 19; reestablished, 19.
in normal schools: lack of, 249 if.; "educa-
tional adviser" proposed, 255 f.; faculty
committee for, 257; departmental aid in,
257.
of practice teaching, 213 ff.; lesson plans,
215; class inspection, 216; conferences,
217; testing results, 219; ratio of student-
teachers to supervisors, 213, note 1 ; status
and equipment of supervisors, 213 f.
Supervisors, Elementary : at St. Louis, 371 f. ;
at Kansas City, 371 f.
Supervisors of practice teaching: training of,
100, 213 f., 283, Table 9, p. 421; salaries of,
213, 284 f., Table 16, p. 424.
Supply of teachers in Missouri, 265 ff.
Systematic and summarizing courses, Place
of, 393.
TEACHERS: importance of, to education, 8;
changes necessary in profession, xviii, 9;
distinctions in status of, 9, 135 ff. ; disparity
in status an obstacle to progress, 137;
length of preparation, 9; as artists, 179,
235, 255; "born" versus trained, 252; re-
ward and status of, 10, 81 f.
Married women : attitude toward, 139 ff.; why
not employed, 140 f.; efficiency and special
qualifications of, 141 f.; prohibition of,
harmful, 11, 142 ff.; would improve condi-
tions, 144.
Responsibility of, to public, xvii, 12; better
salaries for, attitude of educational officers
toward, 14; money available for, 14; rela-
tion of state administration to, 64 f. ; prep-
aration and supply of, a state problem, 65 ;
tenure of, see Tenure.
Teachers at Harris Teachers College, 116.
Teachers in Missouri normal schools, 99 ff.,
276 ff. ; cooperation of, in the present study,
61; data from, 401 ff., 403; statistics con-
cerning. Tables 5-21, pp. 419 if.; age, sex,
parentage of, 99, Tables 5, 6, p. 419; other
teachers in family of, 99, Table 7, p. 419.
Training of: secondary, 99; degrees held,
100 ff., Tables 8-10, pp. 420 ff.; degrees
compared with Soldan High School and
state university, 101, Table 8 B, p. 420;
geography of training, 102 ; sources of de-
grees, 102, Table 10, p. 422; combinations
of training, 102 f., Table 11, p. 422; retar-
dation in training, 103 f.; retardation
and graduate work, 104 f.; departmental
distribution of degrees, 282 ff., Table 9, p.
421.
Experience in teaching, 105, Table 12, p. 422;
combinations of experience, 106, Table 13,
p. 423; varieties of experience, 106, Table
14, p. 423; experience in local conditions,
281; visits to local schools, 282; exchange
with local teachers, 282.
Economic status of, 113 ff.; family and de-
pendents of, 113; salaries of, 114f., Table
15, p. 423; salaries by departments, 284 f.,
Table 16, p. 424; salaries by grade of work,
285 f., Table 18, p. 425; work of best-paid,
114f.; insurance of, 116.
Appointment and tenure of, 113, 280 f.; not
true faculties, 276 f., 395; ranking of, 277;
effects of elective system on, 277 ff. ; depart-
mental initiative, 277; leaves of absence,
281 f.; secondary versus collegiate work of,
285, Table 19, p. 425; effect of secondary
work on, 286; teaching assignment, 107 f.;
length of programs, 108 £., Table 17,p. 425;
wasteful use of, 258, Tables 46, 47, pp.
436 f.; effect of universities on, 76 f., 102;
cleavage among, 77, 80 f.; of professional
subjects, status of, 100, 213 f., 248, 284 f.,
395, Tables 9, 16, pp. 4-21, 424; of academic
subjects, 199 ff., 394; collegiate standards
applied to, 110, 286, 395 ; part-time and stu-
dent assistants, 286 f., 395.
Quality of, 286; in professional subjects.
248; in agriculture, 248; in natural sciences,
248; compared with supervised teachers,
249; primary function of, 248; means for
improvement of, 253 f, ; productive scholar-
ship of, 111 f.; attitude toward professional
work, 112.
in summer sessions, 288 ff. : training of, 289,
395, Table 20, p. 426; hours and salaries of,
290, 395, Table 21, p. 427.
Place of, in a reorganized system, 57 f., 395.
Teachers in Missouri public schools: data from,
3,465; average monthly salaries of, 20;
census of the teaching population, 3, 265 ff.,
361 ff.,405, Tables 51-58, pp. 438 ff.; num-
ber and kind needed, 265 ff.; supply of,
how to be secured, 268 ff., 383; legislation
required for, 269, 305, 388 ff.; certification
of, 345 ff., 396; as officers of the state, 347;
appointment of, from normal schools,
349 ff,, 396; in service, normal schools re-
sponsible for, 352; judgment of, concern-
ing elements in training, 404, 442; propos-
als for preparation of, 387 ff.; proposals for
salaries of, 383; effect of salaries on quality
of service, 382 f .
in high schools : distinguished from elemen-
tary teachers, 135; why longer training, 13%
preparation furnished in normal schools,
85; curricula for, in normal schools, 152;
number and kind needed in Missouri (1915),
267 f. ; inexperienced group of, 268; subjects
taught by, 268, Table 58, p. 440; tenure of,
267 f.; training of (1915), 268, 371 ff., Tables
56, 57, p. 439; duration and character of
normal school attendance, 373 ff., 376,
Tables 56, 57, p. 439; salaries of, 375 f.
in graded elementary schools : early normal
schools chiefly for, 83 1; distinguishedfrom
high school teachers, 135 f.; why shorter
474
INDEX
training, 132 ff.; lack of professional effort
among, 143 £.; number and kind needed,
267; inexperienced group of, 367; tenure of,
267,367 f.; preparation of (1915), 267, 364 ff.;
duration and character of normal school at-
tendance, 365 f., 369 f., Tables 51-55, pp.
438 f.; salaries of, 137, 367 f., 370 f., 373,
383.
in rural schools: number and kind needed,
266; inexperienced group of, 266,3631;
preparation of (1915), 266, 361 ff.; duration
and character of normal school attendance,
362 f.; salaries of, 269 f., 362 f., 383.
Teachers in United States, Preparation of,
earliest advocacy of, 22 ff.; early writers on,
22 if.; early experiments, 23 f.; development
of public opinion, 24; efforts of educational
leaders, 25 f . ; example of Germany, 25, 27 ;
Francke's Seminarium praeceptorum, 27;
popularized by Charles Brooks, 25; see fur-
ther, Normal schools in United States.
Teachers College, New York : general examina-
tion at, 338 ; treatment of data at, 405.
Teachers, Colored, see Lincoln Institute.
Teaching: elements of technique in, 251 f.; as
a fine art, 179, 235, 251, 255; use of good
models in, 253 ; criticism of, desirable, 355 ;
opportunity for an "educational adviser"
for, 955, 395 ; intentions of students in nor-
mal schools as to, 74, 124, £93, Tables 40,
41, p. 434.
Teaching in normal schools: versus research,
1101; the foremost feature, 111; quality
of, important to the curriculum, 247 ff.;
characteristics of, S48; should be exem-
plary, 249, 394 1
Teaching, Student, in normal schools : position
of, in normal school curriculum, 224, 392 1 ;
skill versus professional intelligence in,
180 f., 187, 393; models of, 2351
Teaching experience, see Experience.
Teaching population of Missouri : statistics of,
265 ff., 361 ff., 405, Tables 51-57, pp. 438 f.
Technique in teaching, see Teaching.
Tenure: of elementary teachers, 136; of elemen-
tary teachers in Missouri (1915), 267; of high
school teachers in Missouri (1915), 267; ef-
fect of marriage on, 139 ff. ; waste of present
system, 1421; in Europe, effects of, 143;
of normal school teachers, 113, 280.
Tests of training-school work, 5, 2091, 219,
404, 443 ff.
Thorndike, E. L., 148, 442, 454.
Training classes, High school: in Minnesota,
176; product of, 266, 3621; increased de-
mands upon, 269.
Training of teachers, see Preparation of teach-
ers.
Training (normal) schools, City: curricula in,
169, Table 4, pp. 4171; weakness of, 171;
opportunities of, 172; problems of, com-
pared with state normal schools, 272 ; col-
lection and treatment of data at, 402 ff.
Training schools for practice teaching in Mis-
souri, 192 ff.; established, 36; size of, 192;
formulae for size of, 195; minimal practice
facilities, 193; control of local facilities ne-
cessary, 193, 394; size of practice classes,
193 1; proportion of student-teaching, 194;
facilities at the normal schools, 195 ff.;
housing- and equipment of, 197; bad con-
ditions easily remedied, 198; relations with
other departments, 199, 3931; lack of co-
operation, 199 if.; difficulties of coopera-
tion, 201; organized cooperation, 2011;
organization of, 202, 394; qualifications of
" Cabinet," 202; spirit and morale, 205;
reasons for low morale, 207; laissez-faire
policy a mistake, 20S; program of studies
in, 219; experiments with the curriculum,
220; facilities at Harris Teachers College,
196; apprentice system, 202 1; defects and
advantages, 203; suggested improvements,
204 1
Practice teaching in : secondary curricula, 176,
392; prerequisite courses in observation,
211 1; supervision of, 213 ff.; supervisory
staff, 3131; methods, 214 ff.; inspection of
class work, 216; testing results of, 219;
concentrated versus distributed, 222 ff.; con-
centrated form at Harris Teachers College,
224; most favorable position of, 224; parti-
cipation should begin early, 221.
Results of standard tests, 5, §09 f., 404,
443 ff.; arithmetic, 446 ff., 455; spelling,
4491; penmanship, 4501, 455; reading-,
451 1, 455; composition, 452; final ranking,
453; correlations, 454, 456; progress in se-
lected abilities, 454, 455; performance in
Courtis tests, 455.
UNIVERSITIES: preparation of teachers in, 4;
should include the normal schools, 13, 55 ff.r
388 ff. ; criticisms of normal schools by, 76 1 ,
951
University of Missouri: early plan for teacher-
training, 34; school of education estab-
lished, 87; relations with high schools, 52,
87; "approved list" of high schools used
by normal schools, 308 ; relations with nor-
mal schools, 39 1, 51 1, 89; training of nor-
mal school teachers at, 102, Table 10, p.
422; should include normal schools, 12,
55ff.,388ff.
History and government, courses in, 235; an-
cient languages, courses in, 232; English,
courses in, 228; mathematics, courses in,
236; small classes justified, 260; proportion
of failures at, 323, note 1.
Teachers at: degrees of, 101, Table 8 B, p.
420; combinations of training, 102 1, Table
11, p. 422; experience of, 106, Table 12, p.
422; salaries of, 114, Table 15, p. 423.
Elementary experimental school at, 443, note
1; program of studies of, 220; standard
tests of, 443 ff.; arithmetic, 446 ff., 455;
spelling, 449; penmanship, 450; reading,
INDEX
475
451; composition, 452 f. ; final rank, 453;
progress in selected abilities, 454 f. ; se-
lected correlations, 454, 456.
Product of: normal school students, 360 f.;
among the teaching- population: elemen-
tary teachers, 370; high school teachers,
373 f,, 376; superintendents, 377 f., 380;
judgments of graduates as to training, 442.
Upper grades, Training for, 154.
VANBIVER, W. D., 84.
Visits to the normal schools, Data concerning,
404.
WAR, The Great: effect on education, xviii; on
the normal schools, 6.
Warrensburg, Normal school at: establishment
of, 34 f. ; county promoters repudiate
pledge, 35; growth in numbers, 37; finan-
cial obstacles, 38; age limit raised, 39; lo-
cal character of first board, 43; politics in
Board of Regents, 47 f.; need of funds at,
49; early professional purpose, 70; pledge
to teach, 73, 307; fidelity to professional
purpose, 73, 355; function of president at,
274; removal of president, 47 f., 281, note;
records at, 336; administration of credit at,
336 f . ; first summer session introduced, 36,
301, note 2; attitude toward examinations,
310, note 4.
Teachers at : data from, 4O1 f.; degrees of,
Table 8, p. 430 ; salaries of, 114, Table 15,
p. 493; salaries by departments, Table 16,
p. 424; salaries in department of education,
284; programs of, 108, Table 17, p. 425;
secondary instruction required of, Table 19,
p. 425; teachers' meetings, 275 ; part-time
student instructors, 286; summer instruc-
tors, 289 : training of, Table 20, p. 426; sal-
aries and programs of, Table 21, p. 427.
Students at : data from, 403 f . ; classified en-
rolment, Table 22, p. 428; " standard" en-
rolment, Table 22 B, p. 428; proportion of
men, Table 23, p. 428 ; secondary enrolment,
Table 25, p. 429; nationality of parents,
Table 27, p. 429; occupation of father, Table
28, p. 430; income of father, Table 29, p.
431 ; size of family, Table 32, p. 431 ; other
teachers in family, Table 33, p. 432 ; normal
school attendance of family, Table 34, p.
432; high school attendance, 120, note 3,
Table 35, p. 432 ; teaching experience, Table
38, p. 433 ; teaching intentions, Table 40, p.
434; programs of, 318 f., Tables 42, 43, pp.
434 f. ; grades of, Tables 44, 45, p. 435; com-
parison of grades of students prepared at
normal schools and those prepared at high
schools, Table 37, p. 433; size of classes,
Table 46, p. 436; method of classification,
316; credentials required for credit, 311;
** approved list" of high schools recog-
nized, 31 1 ; teacher and student opinion on
irregular attendance of, 306.
Curriculum at : rural life problems, 175, note;
modern foreign languages, 234, Table 1, p.
407; mathematics, 237, Tables 1,2, pp. 408,
411 ; hygiene, 24O, Table 1, p. 4O8; commer-
cial subjects, 243, Tables 1,2, pp. 409 if.,
411; physical training, 247, Tables 1, 2,
pp. 410 f.; practice facilities, 195 ff.
Training school at: housing and equipment
of, 197; lack of cooperation in, 199; dem-
onstration teaching, 212 f. ; lesson plans,
216; tests of training-school work, 443 ff.;
arithmetic, 446 f£. , 455 ; spelling, 449 f . ;
penmanship, 450 f.; reading, 451; compo-
sition, 452 f.; final rank, 453; progress in
selected abilities, 454 f.; selected correla-
tions, 454, 456.
Product of: in teaching population : rural
teachers, 362 ; graded elementary teachers,
365 f., Tables 51-55, pp. 438 f.; Kansas City
teachers, 370, note; high school teachers,
51, 374, note, Table 57, p. 439; city and
town superintendents, 378; county super-
intendents, 380, note; analysis made of
candidates for appointment, 351 ; propor-
tion of graduates, 345, 357; four-year
bachelor's degrees from, 344, Table 48, p.
437; employment of graduates of (1915),
Table 49, pp. 437 f.; judgments of gradu-
ates as to training, 442.
Washington University, St. Louis, experience
of teachers in, 106.
Waste in normal school administration, 258 iff.,
302 ff., 313 if., Tables 46, 47, pp. 436 f.
Whipple, G. M., 183, note.
Winona, Minn., Normal school at, 32 f.
Wisconsin : educational organization in, 65 f. ;
normal school survey in, 181, note.
Woodbridge, William C., on preparation of
teachers (1831), 25.
Yornsro, Samuel, on preparation of teachers, 30.
Ypsilanti, State normal school at, 31 ; curricu-
lum in, 32.
ZOOLOGY-, Courses in, 239, Table 1, p. 408.
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